December 15: Birthday of Gustave Eiffel (1832)
Prayer Idea
Pray for civil engineers who design and build things.
History Note
Gustave Eiffel was born on December 15, 1832, in Dijon, France. His father, François, had served in Napoleon’s army. His mother, Catherine, started a coal business that became quite successful.
Eiffel started working with metal and became a railway engineer. He managed construction of the Bordeaux Bridge at age 26. Throughout his career, he was involved with planning and building projects in Europe, Africa, Asia, and North and South America.
Though Eiffel helped to design the interior framework for the Statue of Liberty, his most famous project is the tower that bears his name. Employees at Eiffel’s workshop built 18,000 parts and shipped them to Paris. A team of about 250 workers assembled the tower over a period of two years.
Created for the 1889 Exposition Universelle, the Eiffel Tower rose to 300 meters (984 feet), far surpassing the Washington Monument to become the tallest structure in the world. It attracts millions of visitors each year.
Gustave Eiffel and his wife, Marguerite, had five children: Claire, Laure, Valentine, Edouard, and Albert. A group of their descendants formed the Association des Descendants de Gustave Eiffel in 1995 to honor their ancestor’s legacy.
When Wesley Notgrass was in Paris during World War II, he took this photo of the Eiffel Tower.
Learn More
This collection of photographs by Louis Emile Durandelle, Henri Riviere, Freres Neurdein, Hyacinthe Cesar Delmaet, Theophile Feau, and Roger Viollet document the construction of the Eiffel Tower.
Find more resources at Homeschool History.
