In the late nineteenth century, a French company began building what would come to be considered one of the greatest engineering achievements in human history. The Panama Canal, a 50-mile (80 kilometer) lock canal across the Isthmus of Panama, cuts through a diverse cultural landscape of colonial ruins, townships, industrial sites, and dense tropical jungle. (...)
In the late nineteenth century, a French company began building what would come to be considered one of the greatest engineering achievements in human history. The Panama Canal, a 50-mile (80 kilometer) lock canal across the Isthmus of Panama, cuts through a diverse cultural landscape of colonial ruins, townships, industrial sites, and dense tropical jungle. As the link between North and South America, the isthmus was once an important site of continental cultural exchange between indigenous peoples. After the colonization of Panama, beginning in the fifteenth century, the region became a crucial trading point within the Spanish imperial economy. It was also the location of the world’s first transcontinental railroad in the nineteenth century.
The construction of the French canal began in 1880 under the leadership of Ferdinand de Lesseps. Originally envisaged as a sea-level waterway, the project soon proved infeasible and was abandoned. In 1903, the United States signed a treaty which provided the land for the “constructions, operation, sanitation, and protection” of the isthmian canal as well the recognition of Panamanian independence from Colombia. George Goethals, a U.S. army officer and civil engineer, supervised the construction of the canal, which was completed in 1914. The Panama Canal Area was administered by the United States until 1999 when it was returned to Panamanian ownership.
