ercy of the Commission. W. E. Hale, promoter of the water balance
elevator--who by then had a strong voice in Otis' affairs--expressed the
seriousness of the matter in a letter to the company's president, Charles
R. Otis, following receipt of Brown's report on the Paris conference.
Referring to the controversial cogwheel, Hale wrote

... if this must be arranged so that the car is effected [sic] in its
operation by constant contact with the rack and pinion ... so as to
communicate the noise and jar, and unpleasant motion which such an
arrangement always produces, I should favor giving up the whole
matter rather than allying ourselves with any such abortion.... we
would be the laughing stock of the world, for putting up such a
contrivance.

This difficult situation apparently was the product of a somewhat general
contract phrased in terms of service to be provided rather than of
specific equipment to be used. This is not unusual, but it did leave open
to later dispute such ambiguous clauses as "adequate safety devices are to
be provided."

Although faced with the loss not only of all previously expended design
work but also of an advertisement of international consequence, the
company apparently concurred with Hale and so advised Paris.
Unfortunately, there are no Otis records to reveal the subsequent
transactions, but we may assume that Otis' threat of withdrawal prevailed,
coupled as it was with Eiffel's confidence in the American equipment. The
system went into operation as originally designed, free of the odious rack
and pinion.

That, unfortunately, was not the final disagreement. Before the fair's
opening in May 1889, the relationship was strained so drastically that a
mutually satisfactory conclusion to the project must indeed have seemed
hopeless. The numerous minor structural modifications of the Tower legs
found necessary as construction progressed had necessitated certain
equivalent alteration to the Otis design insofar as its dependency upon
the framework was affected. Consequently, work on the machinery was set
back by some months. Eiffel was informed that although everything was
guaranteed to be in full operation by opening day on May 1, the
contractual deadline of January 1 could not possibly be met. Eiffel, now
unquestionably acting on his own volition, responded by cable, refusing
all payment. Charles Otis' reply, a classic of indignation, disclosed to
Eiffel the je