The story started in 1886, when France held a contest for a striking centerpiece at the 1889 World's Fair that would celebrate the downfall of the Bastille. Entrepreneur Gustave Eiffel entered the running. He had experience building railroad bridges, and his proposal for a new monument — a tower — looked extremely industrial and was an unlikely entry in a field that already included some unusual competition (another proposed monument was a massive model of a guillotine).

As it turned out, French officials liked Eiffel's plan because he had technical expertise and an ambition to set new records for height. "The whole thing — to Eiffel — was that the French would have the tallest building in the world," says Jill Jonnes, author of Eiffel's Tower. "It would be twice as tall, and he knew technically how to do this."

But though Eiffel's tower planned to set records, it wasn't without controversy. The building was radically industrial, and that chafed against the sensibilities of more refined Parisians. The aggressively modern plans for the tower inspired intellectuals and artists to battle against it in an over-the-top letter in 1887. The new building created a clash between France's artistic and industrial voices.