he first read about the proposed construction of the Twin Towers and saw drawings of the project in a magazine he read in 1968 while sitting at a dentist's office.

What was called the "artistic crime of the century" took Petit six years of planning. During this period, he learned everything he could about the buildings and their construction. In the same period, he began to perform highwire walking at other famous places. Rigging his wire secretly, he performed as a combination of circus act and public display. In 1971, he performed his