The+Panama+Canal

// The Panama Canal // [] How and why did the US end up with a canal in Panama? In 1850, U.S. interests in Panama built a railroad across the Isthmus to transport '49ers to California. In 1879, the French, fresh from their success in building the Suez Canal, started building the canal. Over the next 20 years, between 16,000 and 22,000 workers died from malaria, yellow fever, typhoid, snake bites, and accidents. Torrential rains averaging 200 inches a year washed away much of the work. America's 1898 war with Spain made a canal seem essential. During the Spanish American War, the only way for U.S. battleships to sail from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean was to make an 8,000 mile journey around Cape Horn at the tip of South America.The Isthmus of Panama was located in Colombia, which had rejected a U.S. proposal to build a canal. A French adventurer, Philippe Bunau-Varilla, and an American lawyer, Nelson Cromwell, conceived of the idea of creating the Republic of Panama. They persuaded Roosevelt to support a Panama. Bunau-Varilla engineered a revolution and U.S. warships prevented Colombia from stopping Panama's attempt to break away (In 1921, the U.S. paid an indemnity to Colombia in recognition of the U.S. role in the Panamanian revolution).  t its peak in 1913, the workforce consisted of 44,000 persons. West Indian workers were the canal's unsung heroes. Each day, 200 trainloads of dirt had to be hauled away. More than 25,000 worked as canal diggers--three times the number of Americans who worked on the canal. Between 1904 and 1915, some 5,600 lives were lost to disease and accidents.Built at a cost of $387 million over a period of 10 years, the Panama Canal was a declaration of America's coming of age in the world. In 1999 the United States voluntarily gave up the Panama Canal, ending 85 years of control. PAST 

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