Highly Strung Markets
Early morning on 7 August 1974 – fifty years ago – New Yorkers noticed a strange sight on their famous skyline. A young French artist named Philipe Petit had snuck up onto the roof of the South Tower of the World Trade Center. Using a bow and arrow, he shot fishing line across to the North Tower, which his accomplices used to guide a tightrope between the two skyscrapers, then still the tallest buildings on earth. Petit carefully walked across six times with nothing but a balancing beam to assist him, the giant city awakening 400m below, and only summer sky above. It was an act that was at once crazy and captivating.