ABSTRACT
Gustave Eiffel, the « iron wizard », is an exemplary case of entrepreneurial success. A graduate of the French Ecole Centrale, he was responsible for the engineering work on the Bordeaux bridge. Setting up his own firm, initially in partnership with Seyrig, he scored outstanding successes in foreign markets — the Maria Pia bridge over the Douro, the Budapest railway station —, while staking out early on strong positions in Indochina. Stealing a march on the larger, leading firms of the time, he secured on the home front contracts for schemes of major importance — the Garabit viaduct, the Nice Grand Equatorial observation cupola, the Eiffel Tower —, a helpful factor in this respect being the support he could enlist among his connections in masonic circles. Implicated in the Panama scandal, he retired from business involvements, and his final years were devoted to work on meteorology, wireless telegraphy and aerodynamics.
