The Day the Eiffel Tower Was Secretly Rewired by a Con Artist

He didn’t steal it. He didn’t climb it. He just quietly hijacked it—and used it to broadcast to the world.

In 1925, a forgotten French radio enthusiast named Gustave Ferrié used the Eiffel Tower not as a monument—but as a giant experimental antenna. While officially it was still a tourist site, Ferrié secretly rewired the tower’s frame with powerful transmitters. From this makeshift lab at the top, he broadcast some of Europe’s earliest transcontinental radio signals, including timekeeping pings and even military Morse code. No one noticed at first—but soon, radios as far as Morocco and Siberia were receiving strange tones from the Eiffel Tower. It was the birth of France’s wireless future, hidden in plain sight.

“The Eiffel Tower was no longer just steel and rivets—it became France’s voice in the sky.”

~ Dr. Pascal Leleu, historian of French engineering

“Ferrié saw a monument and imagined a transmitter. He tuned Paris into a global broadcast.”

~ Professor Gabriel Duval, French communications researcher

“He didn’t ask for permission. He just plugged the world into Paris.”

~ Jean-Claude Bouillon, radio archivist

“The signals bounced off the ionosphere. Suddenly, a tower could speak to the Sahara.”

~ Dr. Marie Latour, geophysics expert

“It was a quiet revolution. Not in marble or ink—but in invisible waves.”

~ Laurent Joffrin, journalist and author

Knock-on effect: Ferrié’s work helped transform the Eiffel Tower from an architectural oddity into a national asset. His experiments laid the groundwork for international radio, GPS precursors, and time synchronization networks. Today, the tower still broadcasts radio and digital signals—thanks to a forgotten genius who quietly turned iron into airwaves.