(Originally published by the Daily News on August 8, 1974. This story was written by Vincent Lee and Arthur Mulligan.)
A 25-year-old French daredevil did a tightrope walk across the top of New York yesterday – on a 131-foot cable strung between the 110-story twin towers of the World Trade Center.
Tolerant authorities said they would drop criminal trespassing and disorderly conduct charges if he would stage similar performance for the public, possibly in Central Park, and at a less dizzing height, within a week. He agreed.
The aerialist, accomplished juggler and unicyclist, is Philippe Petit, who said, “I see three oranges and I have to juggle. I see two towers and I have to walk.”
He has performed similar high-wire walks between the twin towers of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and on the harbor bridge in Sydney, Australia.
Yesterday’s stroll, 1,350 feet above street level, last 50 minutes, from 7:05 to 7:55 a.m. Four times the 25-year-old Petit, who started out from the north tower, walked to a point near the south tower and then back north. Once he sat down on the wire cable – which is an inch in diameter – and another time he lay down on his back on the cable.
Thousands of petrified onlookers, including pedestrians, motorists, early morning office workers and frustrated police, watched helplessly as Petit defied what seemed certain death. Twice he bowed from the waist to the crowds below.
He finally relented and walked onto the roof of the south tower and into the arms of waiting cops. He did so after on burly cop shouted at him, “Get the hell off there or I’m coming out after you.”
The cops took him and his friend, Jean Heckel, 25, who reportedly assisted Petit in stringing the cable, to Beekman-Downtown Hospital for observation. It was quickly determined that they were normal and sane and very proud of Petit’s accomplishment.
Kuh Intervenes
The cops then took them in hand again and charged them with criminal trespassing and disorderly conduct.
In Manhattan Criminal Court, District Attorney Richard Kuh told Judge Archie Gorfinkel, that he would be willing to move to drop the charges if Petit would put on an act, including high-wire walking, juggling and unicycling, in some Manhattan park.
The judge agreed that it sounded okay and Kuh said he and the Parks Department would work out the details with Petit.
At this point, a Legal Aid Society lawyer said that Heckel would like to leave the country and return to France immediately. The judge said, “Bon voyage,” and released both defendants in their own custody. They both gave their address as 422 W. 22d St. the charges could be renewed if Petit failed to deliver on his pledge.
Police believed he had other accomplices on the towers. Heckel was on the south tower, along with a man who said he was a press photographer but who disappeared while the cops were nabbing Petit.
Petit, 5-feet 7, and lean, was clad in a black leotard and black ballet shoes. He balanced himself on the cable with a 20-foot collapsible pole. He had apparently planned the feat, which included the use of a crossbow to bridge the span, for several months.
Sidney Fields, “Only Human” columnist of The News, reported on Petit last June 24, when he found Petit unicycling and juggling and passing the hat for a living on the sidewalks of Manhattan. Petit said then he would “walk for happiness across the top of New York.” He didn’t say when, where or how.
John Tillman, head of the Port Authority’s public affairs department, said that Petit and two other young men, who gave their names as James Moore and Mark Lewis, showed up at Tillman’s office in the World Trade Center, which is operated by the Port Authority, last May 22.
Petit said that he and Moore were writers and Lewis a photographer for a Paris magazine, Metropolis. Peit said they were doing an article on high-rise buildings and wished to inspect the center on Manhattan’s Lower West Side.
They were given VIP treatment and escorted to the roof of the south tower, Tillman said. He added that there was no reason at the time to suspect that they were not what they said they were.
David Forman, who said he was a rock singer and a friend of Petit’s, said that he and as many as five other pals of the tight-rope artist carried the equipment into the center over the last three days. They had posed as workmen, delivery men and messengers, he said.
Foreman said that Petit, who hails from Nemours, France, had come here last winter with but one idea in mind. He had seen a picture of the twin towers, second highest building in the United States, and decided he couldn’t rest until he challenged them.
“That’s the only reason he has in the States,” Forman said.
Police said that late Tuesday, Petit, an unknown number of pals, and Heckel hid themselves on the roofs of the two towers. Shortly after dawn yesterday, Petit and his accomplices shot an arrow over to the south tower. Attached to the arrow was a fishing line, and attached to that the cable.
The Cable is Strung
The cable was then hauled across the gap, fastened to metal building posts at both ends and the great space walk began.
At first hardly anyone noticed, but the phones began ringing in newspaper offices, police headquarters, the Port Authority police station in the World Trade Center and elsewhere around the city.
Traffic Patrolmen Pete Fuomo, on duty near City Hall, looked at the towers, half a mile away, and couldn’t believe his eyes. He yelled to another cop at a nearby police garage, “There’s somebody walking between the two towers.”
The other cop didn’t believe him until he saw it for himself. Then he called the Communications Bureau. They already had been notified.
Traffic Jams Begin
Port Authority and city cops, including Emergency Squad No. 1, rushed to the towers. Petit had been spotted by motorists who had stopped their cars to watch, with resulting traffic snarls throughout the area.
Police didn’t know at first that Petit could speak English and they had Heckel relay instructions to him in French. But when a Port Authority sergeant, Charles Daniels, started speaking in French to Petit, the latter answered in English. He gave up his walk a short time later.
He apparently was the only one involved who wasn’t scared to death. He said he was not afraid, but admitted it was the “craziest thing I ever did in my life.”
He said he had chosen the towers because it was the highest point in the U.S. where you could string a cable. You can’t do that he said, on the Sears Tower in Chicago, which is 120 stories high and the highest in the world.
