In 1534, Charles I of Spain ordered the first survey of a proposed canal route
through the Isthmus of Panama. More than three centuries passed before the first
construction was started. The French labored 20 years, beginning in 1880, but
disease and financial problems defeated them. In 1903, Panama and the United States
signed a treaty by which the United States undertook to construct an inter-oceanic
ship canal across the Isthmus of Panama. The following year, the United States
purchased from the French Canal Company its rights and properties for $40 million
and began construction. The monumental project was completed in ten years at a cost
of about $387 million. The engineering problems involved digging through the
Continental Divide; constructing the largest earth dam ever built up to that time;
designing and building the most massive canal locks ever envisioned; constructing the
largest gates ever swung. |
