Conférence "Mélanie Eiffel, mère de Gustave Eiffel, femme d'entreprise moderne en Bourgogne"

The Society for Historical and Natural Studies organises monthly lectures throughout the year. These lectures are open to all and cover a wide range of subjects.

Lecture by Véronique Brunet

The lecture

When her son Gustave was born in 1832, Mélanie Moneuse set up a wood and coal trading business on the Burgundy canal to supplement the family income. She became one of the first female captains of modern industry. Methodical and determined, she grew her business in the port of Dijon and made a fortune in ten years. This enabled her to offer her son Gustave the chance to study engineering in Paris, before helping to set up her company in Levallois in 1865. On the strength of her experience, she remained his advisor even when he sought to marry. Mélanie Eiffel was an exceptional woman who passed on strong values to her son, who went on to become one of the world's greatest builders.

The lecturer

Véronique Brunet is an independent researcher with a doctorate in art history and architecture from the University of Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, specialising in modernism in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

She has written a biography of Valentine de Saint Point, a female poet and Lamartine's great-niece. This led her to join the Académie de Mâcon.

She has conducted in-depth research into the Eiffel archives at the Musée d'Orsay and has written several books on Mélanie Eiffel and Gustave Eiffel. She curated the exhibition "Eiffel, a childhood in Burgundy" at the Château du Clos de Vougeot from September 2022 to October 2023 to mark the centenary of his death.

She has recently been working on the pioneers of the abolition of slavery in Burgundy, and will shortly be presenting several lectures on the subject in Burgundy and Paris.