Difference between revisions of "Panama Canal"
m |
m |
||
| Line 3: | Line 3: | ||
[[Image:Panama Canal Locks.jpg|thumb|left|150px|Miraflores locks]] | [[Image:Panama Canal Locks.jpg|thumb|left|150px|Miraflores locks]] | ||
| − | Originally the French attempted to build a canal through the isthmus, under the leadership of [[Ferdinand de Lesseps]], the visonary who built the [[Suez Canal]]. He was the people's hero; the epitemy of a Frenchman. | + | Originally the French attempted to build a canal through the isthmus, under the leadership of [[Ferdinand de Lesseps]], the visonary who built the [[Suez Canal]]. He was the people's hero; the epitemy of a Frenchman. They began digging on January 20, 1882, with much champange and dynamite. With de Lesseps to guide them, the French were cocky, thinking that such a canal expert could not fail them. During the convention which decided whether they would build the canal, any prophet predicting high costs and death tolls was not heeded. The workers were confident the job would be done |
But this ended their attempt after 22,000 of them died, mostly due to yellow fever. Some 5,609 Americans died in the subsequent successful attempt to build the canal, the lower number reflecting medical advances of the time. | But this ended their attempt after 22,000 of them died, mostly due to yellow fever. Some 5,609 Americans died in the subsequent successful attempt to build the canal, the lower number reflecting medical advances of the time. | ||
Revision as of 22:51, November 8, 2007
A canal in the Isthmus of Panama. Completed in 1914, it was built by the Americans under President Theodore Roosevelt.
Originally the French attempted to build a canal through the isthmus, under the leadership of Ferdinand de Lesseps, the visonary who built the Suez Canal. He was the people's hero; the epitemy of a Frenchman. They began digging on January 20, 1882, with much champange and dynamite. With de Lesseps to guide them, the French were cocky, thinking that such a canal expert could not fail them. During the convention which decided whether they would build the canal, any prophet predicting high costs and death tolls was not heeded. The workers were confident the job would be done But this ended their attempt after 22,000 of them died, mostly due to yellow fever. Some 5,609 Americans died in the subsequent successful attempt to build the canal, the lower number reflecting medical advances of the time.
The canal was not just an engineering, but also a medical triumph, as U. S. Army physician Walter Reed identified the mosquito Aedes aegypti as the carrier of yellow fever. Mosquito-control measures limited the spread of infection and made it possible to complete the work.
Trivia
- A well-known palindrome (a sentence that reads the same forwards and backwards) is:
- A man, a plan, a canal—Panama!
The Path Between the Seas, David McCullough, 1977