March 31, 1889 - The Eiffel Tower opens in Paris.
When the noted French engineer Alexandre Gustave Eiffel first proposed to build a tower as a monument for the Paris Exhibition of 1889, few took him seriously. But he persisted, and when the exhibition opened on March 31, 1889, Eiffel himself raised the French flag at the top of his tower. At that time, the Eiffel Tower was the world's tallest structure, standing 984 feet. Though Eiffel's open latticed wrought iron structure has undergone some renovations, it remains fundamentally unchanged. A top tourist attraction, it was raised in a matter of months by a small labor force at a very low cost. With its grand view of Paris and its symbolic stature, Eiffel's monument is one of the great bargains of modern time.