Santa Maria University

Systems Engineer

Second Semester

English Ⅱ

Written Work: 23/05/2022

Alexand
er
Gustave
Eiffel

Professor: Members:

biography
Andreas Prypchan Ornella Nieves C.I. 29.677.533

Carlos Payot C.I. 30.383.156

Early life:
Alexandre Gustave Eiffel was born in France, in the Côte-d'Or, the first child of Catherine-Mélanie
(née Moneuse) and Alexandre Bonickhausen dit Eiffel. He was a descendant of Marguerite
Frédérique (née Lideriz) and Jean-René Bönickhausen and who had emigrated from the German
town of Marmagen and settled in Paris at the beginning of the 18th century. The family adopted
the name Eiffel as a reference to the Eifel mountains in the region from which they had come.
Although the family always used the name Eiffel, Gustave's name was registered at birth as
Bonickhausen dit Eiffel, and was not formally changed to Eiffel until 1880.

At the time of Gustave's birth his father, an ex-soldier, was working as an administrator for the
French Army; but shortly after his birth his mother expanded a charcoal business she had inherited
from her parents to include a coal-distribution business, and soon afterwards his father gave up
his job to assist her.

Eiffel was not a studious child, and thought his classes at the Lycée Royal in Dijon boring and a
waste of time, although in his last two years, influenced by his teachers for history and literature,
he began to study seriously, and he gained his baccalauréats in humanities and science.

Eiffel went on to attend the Collège Sainte-Barbe in Paris, to prepare for the difficult entrance
exams set by engineering colleges in France, and qualified for entry to two of the most prestigious
schools – École polytechnique and École Centrale des Arts et Manufactures – and ultimately
entered the latter. During his second year he chose to specialize in chemistry, and graduated
ranking at 13th place out of 80 candidates in 1855. This was the year that Paris hosted the second
World's Fair, and Eiffel was bought a season ticket by his mother.

Early career:
After graduation, Eiffel had hoped to find work in his uncle's workshop in Dijon, after a few months
working as an unpaid assistant to his brother-in-law, who managed a foundry, Eiffel approached
the railway engineer Charles Nepveu, who gave Eiffel his first paid job as his private secretary.
However, shortly afterwards Nepveu's company went bankrupt, Nepveu found Eiffel a job
designing a 22 m (72 ft) sheet iron bridge for the Saint Germaine railway. Some of Nepveu's
businesses were then acquired by the Compagnie Belge de Matériels de Chemin de Fer: Nepveu
was appointed the managing director of the two factories in Paris, and offered Eiffel a job as head
of the research department. In 1857 Nepveu negotiated a contract to build a railway bridge over
the river Garonne at Bordeaux, connecting the Paris-Bordeaux line to the lines running to Sète and
Bayonne, which involved the construction of a 500 m (1,600 ft) iron girder bridge supported by six
pairs of masonry piers on the river bed. These were constructed with the aid of compressed air
caissons and hydraulic rams, both innovative techniques at the time.

Eiffel et Cie:
At the end of 1866 Eiffel managed to borrow enough money to set up his own workshops at 48
Rue Fouquet in Levallois-Perret. His first important commission was for two viaducts for the
railway line between Lyon and Bordeaux, and the company also began to undertake work in other
countries, including St. Mark's Cathedral in Arica, Peru, which was an all-metal prefabricated
building, manufactured in France and shipped to South America in pieces to be assembled on site;
first it was intended for the city of Ancón, a beach near Lima, but the Peruvian Government of
President José Balta changed the final destination to Arica because the old church was destroyed
by an earthquake on 13 August 1868. Because of this, a committee of ladies of Arica asked Balta to
relocate Eiffel's structure to Arica.

On 6 October 1868 he entered into partnership with Théophile Seyrig, like Eiffel a graduate of the
École Centrale, forming the company Eiffel et Cie. In 1875, Eiffel et Cie were given two important
contracts, one for the Budapest Nyugati railway station for the Vienna to Budapest railway and the
other for a bridge over the river Douro in Portugal.

The Exposition Universelle in 1878 firmly established his reputation as one of the leading
engineers of the time. As well as exhibiting models and drawings of work undertaken by the
company, Eiffel was also responsible for the construction of several of the exhibition buildings.
One of these, a pavilion for the Paris Gas Company, was Eiffel's first collaboration with Stephen
Sauvestre, who was later to become the head of the company's architectural office.

In 1886 Eiffel also designed the dome for the Astronomical Observatory in Nice. This was the most
important building in a complex designed by Charles Garnier, later among the most prominent
critics of the Tower. The dome, with a diameter of 22.4 m (73 ft), was the largest in the world
when built and used an ingenious bearing device: rather than running on wheels or rollers, it was
supported by a ring-shaped hollow girder floating in a circular trough containing a solution of
magnesium chloride in water. This had been patented by Eiffel in 1881.

The Eiffel Tower:

The design of the Eiffel Tower was originated by Maurice Koechlin and Emile Nouguier, who had
discussed ideas for a centrepiece for the 1889 Exposition Universelle. In May 1884 Koechlin,
working at his home, made an outline drawing of their scheme, described by him as "a great
pylon, consisting of four lattice girders standing apart at the base and coming together at the top,
joined together by metal trusses at regular intervals". Initially Eiffel showed little enthusiasm,
although he did sanction further study of the project, and the two engineers then asked Stephen
Sauvestre to add architectural embellishments. Sauvestre added the decorative arches to the
base, a glass pavilion to the first level and the cupola at the top. The enhanced idea gained Eiffel's
support for the project, and he bought the rights to the patent on the design which Koechlin,
Nougier and Sauvestre had taken out. The design was exhibited at the Exhibition of Decorative
Arts in the autumn of 1884, and on 30 March 1885 Eiffel read a paper on the project to the Société
des Ingénieurs Civils. After discussing the technical problems and emphasising the practical uses of
the tower, he finished his talk by saying that the tower would symbolise

The Panama Scandal:

In 1887, Eiffel became involved with the French effort to construct a canal across the Panama
Isthmus. The French Panama Canal Company, headed by Ferdinand de Lesseps, had been
attempting to build a sea-level canal, but came to the realization that this was impractical. The
plan was changed to one using locks, which Eiffel was contracted to design and build. The locks
were on a large scale, most having a change of level of 11 m (36 ft). Eiffel had been working on the
project for little more than a year when the company suspended payments of interest on 14
December 1888, and shortly afterwards was put into liquidation. Eiffel's reputation was badly
damaged when he was implicated in the financial and political scandal which followed. Although
he was simply a contractor, he was charged along with the directors of the project with raising
money under false pretenses and misappropriation of funds. On 9 February 1893 Eiffel was found
guilty on the charge of misuse of funds, and was fined 20,000 francs and sentenced to two years in
prison, although he was acquitted on appeal. The later American-built canal used new lock designs

Later career:
After his retirement from the Compagnie des Etablissements Eiffel, Eiffel went on to do
important work in meteorology and aerodynamics.
His first aerodynamic experiments, an investigation in the air resistance of surfaces, was
carried out by dropping the surface to be investigated together with a measuring
apparatus down a vertical cable stretched between the second level of the Eiffel Tower
and the ground. Using this Eiffel definitely established that the air resistance of a body was
very closely related to the square of the airspeed. He then built a laboratory on the Champ
de Mars at the foot of the tower in 1905, building his first wind tunnel there in 1909. The
wind tunnel was used to investigate the characteristics of the airfoil sections used by the
early pioneers of aviation such as the Wright Brothers, Gabriel Voisin and Louis Blériot.
Eiffel established that the lift produced by an airfoil was the result of a reduction of air
pressure above the wing rather than an increase of pressure acting on the under surface.
Following complaints about noise from people living nearby, he moved his experiments to
a new establishment at Auteuil in 1912.
Eiffel died on 27 December 1923, while listening to Beethoven's 5th symphony andante, in
his mansion on Rue Rabelais in Paris. He was buried in the family tomb in Levallois-Perret
Cemetery.

Iconic Projects
  Eiffel Tower, Paris, France  Railway bridge over the
(1889) river Garonne, Bordeaux
 Cathedral of San Pedro de (1861)
Tacna, Peru (1875)  Viaduct over the river
 Grand Hotel Traian, Iaşi, Sioule (1867)
Romania (1882)  Viaduct at Neuvial (1867)
 Paradis Latin theatre, Paris,  Swing bridge at Dieppe
France (1889) (1870)
 Casa de Fierro, Iquitos, Peru  Pont de Ferro or Pont Eiffel
(1892) in Girona (1876)
 Estación Central (railway  Maria Pia Bridge (Douro
station) Santiago, Chile, Viaduct) (1877)
(1897)  Cubzac bridge over the
 Iglesia de Santa Bárbara in Dordogne, France (1880)
Santa Rosalía, Baja  Borjomi bridge over the
California Sur, México Tsemistskali River, Georgia
(1897) (1902)
 Aérodynamique EIFFEL  Belvárosi Bridge over the
(wind tunnel), Paris river Tisza in the centre of
(Auteuil), France (1911) Szeged, Hungary (1881)
 Konak Pier, Izmir, Turkey  Mong Bridge over Bến
 La Paz Train Station, La Paz, Nghé River, Ho Chi Minh
Bolivia (now La Paz Bus City, Vietnam (1882) -
Station) removed 2005 and restored
after 2011

The Eiffel Bridge of Venezuela

This iron suspension bridge is located over the Cuyuní River via the Gran Sabana after the town of
El Dorado.

It is said that this structure was acquired by Venezuela to the French Republic in the decade of the
20's of the XIX century, during the government of General Juan Vicente Gomez, this work was
originally assembled on the Guarico River sector hat, once fulfilled its goal in that sector was
dismantled and sent to the municipality Sifontes.

They also affirm that the prefabricated bridge was on a cargo ship which broke down in
Venezuelan waters, its destination was Peru and at the time they did not have the necessary funds
to pay the freight and be able to take the bridge to its destination, finally it was auctioned and
installed where it was least expected.

The use of this metallic structure brought tourism and business development to the population of
El Dorado, Santa Elena de Uairén and the Gran Sabana. There were investments from lumber and
mining companies and many tourists came to visit the Eiffel Bridge, since it served as a link for
vehicular traffic coming from Brazil.

There were many proposals to dismantle and restore it, one of them was to move it to Cuidad
Guayana because of the neglect in which it is located, specifically to assemble it in the La Llovizna
National Park, however the inhabitants of the municipality of Sifontes organized themselves and
were against this action, as has happened with the state of Guárico that would like to have it back
in its place of origin where it was built the first time.

In 1990, the French government tried to buy it in order to install it in a museum in London that
had been built in honor of the creative French engineer. Again the people opposed this action and
managed to stop it.