Eiffel Tower

In 1925, Victor Lustig arrived in Paris and read a newspaper article about the Eiffel Tower falling into disrepair, with paint peeling, maintenance costs soaring, and the city stretched thin trying to keep it upright. The article mentioned public opinion was shifting toward calls for its removal. Parisians despised the thing anyway… critics called it a “barbaric bulk,” and the writer Guy de Maupassant wanted it smashed. Lustig, a con artist with 45 aliases and fluency in five languages, saw opportunity.

He hired a forger to produce fake government stationery, then invited scrap metal dealers to a confidential meeting at an expensive hotel, introducing himself as Deputy Director-General of the Ministry of Posts and Telegraphs. He told them the government wanted to sell the tower for scrap but needed discretion to avoid public outcry. He identified his mark: André Poisson, an insecure businessman desperate to climb Parisian social circles. When Poisson asked questions, Lustig hinted that as a low-paid bureaucrat, he’d appreciate a bribe — which convinced Poisson he must be legitimate. Poisson paid him $70,000. Lustig suspected Poisson would be too embarrassed to report the scam, so he checked Austrian newspapers from abroad (no mention). He returned to Paris and sold it again. The second buyer went to the police, and Lustig fled to the U.S.