NOTE: What follows is an edited encore blog from 2009---a famous date for a famous Paris landmark.
Aside from those turn of the century photos of Native Americans walking across I-beams high above the New York skyline, I am skeptical of anyone who says they are NOT afraid of heights.
How can you NOT be?
When I was 12, I had the privilege of visiting Paris with my parents-and like all good tourists, made the pilgrimage to the Eiffel Tower. We snapped pictures on little cartridge Kodak cameras (you know, the ones with a disposable rotating flash cube on top-remember those?) Anyway, I was OK until the trip to the top.
Oh my.
Of course I survived-and even enjoyed it, but even in the confines of the elevator, I felt that we could tumble to earth at any moment!
The Eiffel Tower is celebrating a birthday today. It was on this date in 1889 that the Tower officially opened with Gustave Eiffel presiding over his creation, a tribute for an exposition marking the centennial of the French Revolution. Originally considered an ugly eyesore to Parisians, it was considered a marvel of engineering and was, at the time, the tallest manmade structure in the world (a distinction it would hold until the Chrysler Building was erected in 1930). At 934 feet, Mr. Eiffel and several others climbed the stairs on this date-as the elevators were not completed yet—and hoisted a French flag at the very top! As time went on, the Eiffel Tower became the very symbol of France/Paris-even though it was almost torn down when the 20 year lease on the land expired in 1909. The only thing that saved the tower from the wrecker’s ball was it’s usefulness as a structure to house radio antennas! (Radio does it again!)
Below is a video clip of a couple of CRAZY people who actually JUMPED from the Eiffel Tower with parachutes! They filmed the ascent—and the trip down as well-amazing!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPyUsyF_OgM
If you’d like my blog in your box, you don’t have to jump off the Eiffel Tower-just let me know: tim.moore@citcomm.com
Viva La Eiffel Tower!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment