We protest in the name of French taste and the national art culture against the erection of a staggering Tower, like a gigantic kitchen chimney dominating Paris, eclipsing by its barbarous mass Notre Dame, the Sainte-Chapelle, the tower of St. Jacques, the Dôme des Invalides, the Arc de Triomphe, humiliating these monuments by an act of madness.[1] Further, a prediction was made that the entire city would become dishonored by the odious shadow of the odious column of bolted sheet iron. It is impossible to determine what influence these outcries might have had on the project had they been organized sooner. But inasmuch as the Commission had, in November 1886, provided 1,500,000 francs for its commencement, the work had been fairly launched by the time the protestations became loud enough to threaten and they were ineffectual. Upon completion, many of the most vigorous protestants became as vigorous in their praise of the Tower, but a hard core of critics continued for several years to circulate petitions advocating its demolition by the government. One of these critics, it was said--probably apocryphally--took an office on the first platform, that being the only place in Paris from which the Tower could not be seen. [Illustration: Figure 3.--Trevithick's proposed cast-iron tower (1832) would have been 1,000 feet high, 100 feet in diameter at the base, 12 feet at the top, and surmounted by a colossal statue. (From F. Dye, _Popular Engineering_, London, 1895, p. 205.)] The Tower's Structural Rationale During the previously mentioned studies of high piers undertaken by the Eiffel firm, it was established that as the base width of these piers increased in proportion to their height, the diagonal bracing connecting the vertical members, necessary for rigidity, became so long as to be subject to high flexural stresses from wind and columnar loading. To resist these stresses, the bracing required extremely large sections which greatly increased the surface of the structure exposed to the wind, and was, moreover, decidedly uneconomical. To overcome this difficulty, the principle which became the basic design concept of the Tower was developed. The material which would otherwise have been used for the continuous lattice of diagonal bracing was concentrated in the four corner columns of the Tower, and these verticals were connected only at two widely separated points by the deep bands of trussing which formed the first and second platforms. A slight curvature inward was given to the main piers to further widen the base and increase the stability of the structure. At a point slightly above the second platform, the four members converged to the extent that conventional bracing became more economical, and they were joined.