Panama Canal

The project of building a canal between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans actually began in 1881, when the French attempted to construct one through Colombia. After the company went bankrupt, the canal was left behind, utterly abandoned.

Shortly thereafter, the United States became interested in a canal, and asked to buy the land from Colombia. They apparently refused to sell, but there is still some speculation today over the depth of our negotiations. As a result, the canal project was halted. But not for long.

In 1903, The United States encouraged a revolt in Colombia. Theodore Roosevelt ordered the US Navy to interfere, and stop the incoming Colombian troops who were trying to put down the rebellion. They were successful, and Colombia was forced to accept the sovereignty of the region in question. The country of Panama was thus formed.

Panama immediately approved plans for the canal, and work began the next year.

The interest in digging a passage through the region of Central America can be dated back almost 500 years. The first potentate to express interest in a canal was Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire, who also happened to be Charles I of Spain. In 1534, he ordered the regional governor of the Panamanian region to do a survey in the area of the Chagres River. The eventually proposed route followed very nearly the same path as the present day canal. However, Charles thought it impossible to successfully dig a canal through that region, and the idea was abandoned for about 300 years, until the inauguration of Ulysses S. Grant as president of the United States in 1869.

Grant had a personal interest going back 17 years, to July 1852, when he was a Captain in the army, leading the American Fourth Infantry across the isthmus to California. In 1869, Grant sent expeditions to Central America. He appointed Navigation Bureau Chief Commodore Daniel Ammen under the command of the Secretary of the Navy. Various surveys were conducted in places such as Tehuantepec, Mexico, Panama, Nicaragua, and many other places. Again, the proposed route for the canal by the Panama team proved to be extremely similar to the present day canal.

Today, the Panama Canal is a valuable asset for both militaries and shipping companies. Anything from cruise ships to battleships to speedboats are permitted through the canal, and tolls can range from under a dollar (for a daring swimmer) to over 100,000 dollars (for large cruise ships).

Panama Canal. As early as the year 1528 the idea of a ship canal across the isthmus was entertained. In 1826 a line for such a canal was traced between Panama and Portobello; and between 1843 and 1874 repeated surveys were made by American, English and French engineers with the same view. See ATRATO.

A route was selected by the distinguished French engineer M. de Lesseps, who constructed the Suez Canal. His original plans contemplated a "sea-level" cutting without locks. Early in 1880 he was upon the ground with his scientific corps, and work was continued till 1889, when the lack of funds compelled a stoppage. The report of the special commission sent out by M. Brunet, the liquidator of the Panama Canal Company, to investigate the condition of the canal, estimates that it would cost $97,000,000 to complete the canal. The total cost was fixed at $180,000,000. The report further said that it would take between seven and eight years to complete it. The annual cost of management was estimated at $2,000,000. In 1897, the United States government appointed a commission, Rear-Admiral John G. Walker, president, to examine and report on the most practicable route for a canal across the isthmus. On Dec. 4, 1900, the commission reported unfavorably to the Panama route. On Jan. 4, 1902, the new Panama Company offered to sell its entire rights to the United States for $40,000,000. The prohibitive price originally asked, over $100,000,000, had been one of the deciding factors in the commission's report favoring the Nicaragua route, and the new offer consequently again opened the whole matter for discussion. It was estimated that under this offer the complete cost of the Panama Canal would be $184,233,358, being about $5,000,000 less than the estimate for the Nicaragua route. In June, 1902, the United States Congress passed a bill accepting the offer and deciding upon Panama as the route for the canal. On Nov. 4, 1903, Panama, formerly a department of Colombia, seceded from that country, declared itself a republic, and assumed all Canal Treaty obligations. The United States at once recognized the new government and negotiated a treaty in which it agreed to pay $10,000,000 for the rights granted, which included the control in perpetuity of a zone of land five miles wide on each side of the canal. In April, 1904, the purchase from the French claimants was completed and the American work on the canal begun. An agitation having arisen on the question of a sea-level vs. a lock canal, this was settled in 1906 in favor of the latter.

The length of the canal will be about 50 miles, including 9½ miles of ocean approaches, leaving the land length about 40½ miles. The canal, as it is now being constructed, will have a summit level of 85 feet above the sea, to be reached by a flight of 3 locks at Gatun, on the Atlantic side, and 3 on the Pacific side, each lock to have a usable length of 1,000 feet and a width of 110 feet. The Gatun dam will make a lake with an area of 104.23 square miles. The bottom width of the canal cut will vary from 300 feet in Culebra Cut to an indefinite width in the lake. It will have a minimum depth of 41 feet. The former very unwholesome condition of the Isthmus was eliminated by a thorough system of sanitation, and the work has progressed with remarkable rapidity. In his annual report for 1910, Chief Engineer Goethals stated the total excavation as 113,450,348 cubic yards; amount still to be removed, 61,216,246 cubic yards; expenditure on work to date, $103,005,169; estimated total cost, excluding payment for French rights, $375,000,000; work expected to be completed by Dec. 1, 1913; and the canal to be officially opened on Jan. 1, 1915.

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Entry from Everybody's Cyclopedia, 1912.