6 Things You Didn't Know About The Eiffel Tower

It's arguably the most famous monument in the world, admired and photographed by millions of travelers and romantics each year. But there's a lot of history behind those 125 years! Read on to find out some fun facts you might not have known.

1. It was once the tallest structure in the world

Completed in 1889, it was the tallest structure in the world until 1930 when the Chrysler Building was completed.

2. People did NOT like it at first

There was a good deal of opposition to the tower when it was being planned:

“We, writers, painters, sculptors, architects and passionate devotees of the hitherto untouched beauty of Paris, protest with all our strength, with all our indignation in the name of slighted French taste, against the erection…of this useless and monstrous Eiffel Tower…To bring our arguments home, imagine for a moment a giddy, ridiculous tower dominating Paris like a gigantic black smokestack, crushing under its barbaric bulk Notre Dame, the Tour Saint-Jacques, the Louvre, the Dome of les Invalides, the Arc de Triomphe, all of our humiliated monuments will disappear in this ghastly dream. And for twenty years…we shall see stretching like a blot of ink the hateful shadow of the hateful column of bolted sheet metal.”

-A petition published in Le Temps

3. Some choice insults:

A "truly tragic streetlamp," a "funnel planted on its own butt," and a "metal asparagus."

4. It was supposed to be town down

Picasa

Built as a centerpiece for the 1889 World Exposition, it was meant to be dismantled after 20 years. The city had begun using it for communication purposes (the addition of an antennae eventually made it taller than the Chrysler Building) so it was saved.

5. It escaped destruction a second time!

"Hitler initially ordered the demolition of the city’s most cherished symbol, but the command was never carried out. Also during the German occupation of Paris, French resistance fighters famously cut the Eiffel Tower’s elevator cables so that the Nazis had to climb the stairs." -History.com

6. Now it welcomes millions each year

After a tumultuous history, the Eiffel Tower now welcomes more than 7 million visitors a year. Repainted every seven years, and attended to by a staff of 500, "le tour Eiffel" is now a cherished and celebrated part of Paris and it's history.