It is interesting to see how France used the World’s Fair as an opportunity to one-up the Asian Crystal Palace with the construction of the Eiffel Tower.  However, the tower also represented something important for the economic classes of the time, which was a clear advancement of the center of wealth from noble, landed wealth to industrial wealth.  What meant more to the people of Paris, or even France? That the Eiffel Tower would trump the Crystal Palace or its symbolism of economic advancement from the Ancien Regime?