text: how did they built the eiffel tower?   the structure was built between 1887 and 1889 as the entrance arch for the exposition universelle, a world's fair marking the centennial celebration of the french revolution. it is located at geographic coordinates 48°51′29″n, 2°17′40″e. the tower was inaugurated on 31 march 1889, and opened on 6 may. three hundred workers joined together 18,038 pieces of puddled iron (a very pure form of structural iron), using two and a half million rivets, in a structural design by maurice koechlin. the risk of accident was great, for unlike modern skyscrapers the tower is an open frame without any intermediate floors except the two platforms. yet because eiffel took good care of his workers with movable stagings, guard-rails and screens, only one man died, during the installation of otis elevator's lifts.  the tower was met with resistance from the public when it was built, with many calling it an eyesore (novelist guy de maupassant ate at a restaurant at the tower regularly, because it was the one place in paris he was sure he wouldn't see it). today, it is widely considered to be one of the most striking pieces of structural art in the world.  one of the great hollywood movie clichés is that the view from a parisian window always includes the tower. in reality, since zoning restrictions limit the height of most buildings in paris to a few stories, only the very few taller buildings have a clear view of the tower.  originally, eiffel had a permit for the tower to stand for 20 years(when ownership of it would revert to the city of paris, who had originally planned to tear it down; part of the original contest rules for designing a tower was that it could be easily torn down), more than recouping his expenses, but as it later proved valuable for communication purposes, it was allowed to remain after the expiry of the permit. the military used it to dispatch parisian taxis to the front line of the marne, and it therefore became a victory statue of that battle. it was also used to catch the infamous "mata hari," and after this, its demolition became unthinkable to the french population.