panama canal course day 1 final

The Panama Canal100 Years of Service to World Commerce

Panama Canal - Class #1


4th Generation Panama Canal Zonian. My great grandfather and grandfather came to the Isthmus in

1906 with their families. My dad was born in Gorgas Hospital in the Canal Zone in May of

1914. I was born in Panama City, Republic of Panama in 1943. Raised in the town of Balboa on the Pacific (South) side of the

Canal Zone. Left the Canal Zone for college in September of 1961. Returned to Panama for visits in the late 60’s, Spring of 1972,

and in January of 2011.

Presented by – Walter Guy Brown Jr.


Introduction…

BlacksmithMachinist

Introduction…Morrison / Brown Clan, 1930’s



Day 1 The Isthmus of Panama The Spanish Era California Gold Rush Panama Railroad The French Enterprise to build a Panama Canal Birth of the Republic of Panama

Class Outline


Day 2 The Engineering Concept of the Canal The Leaders Battling Disease Building the Canal – “Making the Dirt Fly” Opening of the Panama Canal

Day 3 The Workforce Life in the Panama Canal Zone The United States Exit from Panama Recent Panamanian Events The Panama Canal Today The Third Locks Project

Isthmus of Panama



Panama……

The isthmus emerged from the sea (about 3 million years ago) as a result of tectonic plate movements and accompanying volcanic activity.

The new isthmus separated the waters of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, united the continental masses of North and the South America, and created the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf Stream Current.

There was massive interchange of animals resulting in extinctions as well as expansion of flora and fauna.

The Isthmus provided a bridge that included the southerly migration of humans who populated South America .


The Gulf Stream is one of the most prominent surface currents in the world's oceans. It carries warm water from the Gulf of Mexico northward along the eastern coast of

the United States and across the Atlantic. It the joins another current, the North Atlantic Drift, and travels as far as Ireland and

Great Britain affecting the climate of coastal northern Europe and the fishing stocks of the Atlantic.

Panama……


Panama……

Geography of the Isthmus


Panama “Place of Abundant Fish”


The rainy season is from late May to early December. Usually mornings are sunny with intermittent heavy rain in the afternoon. Rainfall is critical to Panama because it is essential to the operation of the

Panama Canal.

Panama……

Abundant Recycled Water, the Engine that enables the engineering concept of the Panama Canal

The Spanish Era



On his 4th voyage Christopher Columbus arrived on the coast of “Panama” on October 16 1502.

Upon arriving, he learned from the natives that there was another ocean just a few days march to the south.

The Spanish…

The Gulf of Uraba


1500: Vasco Nunez de Balboa sailed from Spain to explore “Nueva Granada” and ends up settled on the island of Hispaniola hoping to make a living as a farmer.

1510: Balboa stowed away on a boat sailing from Santo Domingo to New Granada after his attempts at farming failed.

September 1,1513: Balboa sailed with a large party across the Gulf of Uraba further westward along the Darien Peninsula.

The Spanish…

Vasco Nuñez de Balboa

Francisco Pizarro

The famous explorer Francisco Pizarro, who later conquered the Incas was in his party.


Vasco Nuñez de Balboa

The Spanish… While exploring the Caribbean coast of

“Panama”, Balboa also hears from natives about a sea to the south.

On September 25 of 1513, Balboa stands alone on a high point becoming the first European to view what he names the South Sea, what we now know as the Pacific Ocean.


The Spanish… Unfortunately for Balboa, political intrigue brought his career and life to

an end in January of 1519. After four strokes of the axe, Balboa was decapitated in Acla, the settlement from which he had launched his historic trek leading to the discovery of the South Sea.

On his way to be executed, it is purported that Balboa exclaimed "Lies, lies! Never have such crimes held a place in my heart, I have always loyally served the King, with no thought in my mind but to increase his dominions."


The Spanish… However, Balboa ended up with an

impressive monument in Panama City


Spanish Domain

The Spanish… In the years following

Balboa’s discovery and claim to the vast coastal territory of the Pacific Ocean, Spain began its colonization efforts.


Incan Gold & Silver In 1532, 169 Spanish soldiers under Francisco Pizarro began the

defeat & eventually colonization of the Incan Empire along the west coast of South America.

Vast riches then had to be transported back to Spain.

The Spanish…


The Spanish… As early as 1515 the Spanish had learned from natives of

the existence of a better trail across the Isthmus from Porto Bello on the Caribbean Coast to the Pacific Coast.

El Camino Real(The Royal Road)


1517: The Camino Real, a cobbled stone road approximately 3 feet wide was built by 4,000 captured natives.

The route connected Nombre de Dios founded in 1510 & later Porto Bello with Old Panama on the southern coast.

The Spanish…


The Spanish… 1533: A much better route across the Isthmus was decided upon connecting the city

of Panamá to the town of Cruces, on the banks of the Chagres River. This was about 20 miles from Old Panamá.

Once on the river, boats could be used to navigate to the mouth of the Chagres on the Caribbean Sea.


As Nombre de Dios was situated near an unhealthy swamp and was nearly impossible to fortify, it declined in importance.

In June, 1572 the English privateer Sir Francis Drake sacked the colony and in April, 1573 he ambushed the Spanish Silver Train, a mule convoy carrying a fortune in precious metals.

Drake captured the town again in 1595.

The Spanish…


1597: Porto Bello replaced Nombre de Dios as an important Caribbean port. Every year or two, gold, silver and other treasures would be taken down from Peru to

its coast, where it was sent to Panama City to be carried by mules overland to Porto Bello, and loaded onto a heavily armed fleet bound for Spain

The Spanish…


At the mouth of the Chagres, the small town of Chagres was established and fortified.

Fort San Lorenzo was later built on a bluff, overlooking the area. From here, treasures and goods were transported to the Kings Warehouse in Porto Bello, to be stored until the Treasure Fleet left for Spain.

In addition gold and silver, was stored in Old Panamá, until word was received that the Treasure Fleet, was leaving Cartagena, Nueva Granada, for Porto Bello. The gold and silver was then transported on the back of mules to Porto Bello to meet the fleet.

The Spanish…

Chagres

Fort San Lorenzo


1668: English Privateer, Captain Henry Morgan attacks and is able to overcome the strong fortifications of Porto Bello.

After ransacking the fort he then negotiated a 100,000 peso ransom with the Spanish to withdraw.

The Spanish paid up and he promptly left and returned to Jamaica.

The Spanish…

Captain Henry Morgan


By 1671, Morgan was ready for another assault on the Spanish in Panama. With a large contingent, Morgan captured Fort San Lorenzo and began the march overland to Old Panama City engaging in battle on January 28, 1671.

Morgan and his men sacked the city and were gone before any help could arrive. Although it was a military success, Panama's loot had been hidden away before the pirates arrived and stored in ships off shore in the Gulf of Panama. Morgan’s earlier capture of Porto Bello was much more lucrative.

Near the Lajas Reef, Morgan lost five ships including his flagship “Satisfaction” in rough seas on the shallow reef surrounding Fort San Lorenzo.

Wreckage of these ships have just recently been discovered.

The Spanish…

Panama Viejo ( Old Panama)

The Spanish… After Morgan's attack, Panama City had to be rebuilt in a new site a few miles to the

west. The former site is called Panama Viejo and still contains these remaining structures.


“4” ways to get to there: Overland Around tip of South America,

Cape Horn, 14,000 miles from New York

Across the Isthmus of Panama with steamer service to Panama & on to California

Nicaragua also with steamer service.

California Gold Rush ….

Discovery of gold at Sutter’s Saw Mill , Coloma, California on January 24,1848

On October 6, 1848 the S.S. California departed New York on its maiden voyage to bring mail to the Chagres River to be ferried by canoe to Las Cruces, then hauled by mule along ancient Spanish Trail to Panama City.

California Gold Rush …. In 1848 with the War with Mexico over & California an American territory, the

Pacific Mail Steamship Company had acquired a contract to deliver mail from Panama to San Francisco.

The venture was that of a group of New York City merchants and financiers including William H. Aspinwall.

S.S. California


California Gold Rush …. “Commodore” Cornelius Vanderbilt pioneered an alternate route to California. Due to the popularity of Vanderbilt’s Accessory Transit, after selling this venture his

personal wealth rose another $5 million by 1850 (roughly $150 million in current dollars.

San JuanSan Carlos

Lake Nicaragua


California Gold Rush ….

As news of the California Gold Strike spread scores of men leave for Panama and cross to Panama City along the same route as the mail.


Panama Railroad ….

In 1847 William Henry Aspinwall & other New York financiers had already organized the Panama Railroad Company.

In 1850 the company secured an exclusive concession from Nueva Granada (Colombia) allowing construction of a crossing by road, rail, river, or a combination.

This contract granted them six years to build the railroad, and then gave them forty-nine years to run it after completion.

There was an inclusion in the contract that if after 20 years, Nueva Granada wanted, they could buy the railroad for $5 million ($150 million in current dollars), an amount approximating the projected cost of the railroad, and the same as the initial stock offering.


Forty-seven and a half miles of railroad required 170 bridges and culverts of 15 feet or more, 134 bridges and culverts of less than 15 feet, a statistic that gives some idea of the difficulties there had been in making headway in such a “half-drowned” country.



1854 By January, 1854 excavation began at the summit of the Continental Divide,

where the earth had to be cut down over 40 feet. The road over the crest of the Continental Divide at Culebra was finally completed from the Atlantic side in January of 1855, thirty-seven miles of track having been laid from Colón then called Aspinwall.



There was a popular belief among the workers, that for every cross tie on the tracks, one person died.100,000 cross ties were actually used.

However, there were

never more than 6,000 workers used during the construction.

But, unquestionably the death rate was very high due to numerous causes including accidents, disease (Yellow Fever, Malaria, Dysentery, Cholera, Dengue Fever), snake bites, and more.

The damp tropical heat quickly rotted the original crossties and were replaced with lignum vitae from present day Columbia, a wood so dense that holes had to drilled first to accept the spikes.

Laborers had come from China, East Indies, Ireland, England, Germany, and Jamaica.



Shortly after, he was stricken with yellow fever. His Spanish doctor told him and his family that there was no hope for him. Hearing this, Col. Totten roused himself & said, "You are mistaken, sir; not yet. What is to become of the road! Yellow fever can't kill a Totten. I am going to get well!" And he did!

The Panama Railroad Company never honored him in any significant way. There was a small plaque with his profile etched on it in the Panama Railroad station in Panama City, but that is all.

Totten died May 17, 1884, in New York City. The brief obituary in the New York Times failed to say that he was the man directly responsible for building the first transcontinental railroad the world had ever seen.

“Colonel” George M. Totten was the dominating force back of this ambitious project evident by the reports of his energy and almost super-human endurance in prosecuting the enterprise.

After ten years spent in Panama, the first five in construction and the second five years in operation, he was appointed Manager of the Panama Railroad.




1855 January 27,1855, at midnight, in

the pitch dark and in pelting rain, lit by sputtering whale oil lamps, the last rail was set in place on pine crossties. Colonel Totten drove the last spike with a nine-pound maul.

The following day the world's first transcontinental train ran from ocean to ocean.

1855 Notwithstanding all of the difficulties and discouragements, the road was

successfully completed by 1855, just five years from the date of the beginning of its construction, at a cost of $7.4 million (about $220 million in current dollars).


Panama Railroad …. 1861 – 1865

Panama Railroad was used to move troops, materials, and gold from one U.S. coast to the other during the Civil War.

1875 – Original Contract renegotiated Panama Railroad will pay $1 million in gold plus $250,000 a year during the life

of the contract (99 years). Rails extended to the Bay of Panama to deep water ships could reach wharves. Mail, officials and troops of Colombia carried free of charge.

1881 French Canal Company buys

controlling shares in the Panama Railroad Company and employs the railroad during their attempt to build the Panama Canal.

1904 U.S. purchases the railroad from

the French and rebuilds it on higher ground with a heavier gage line. The use of the railroad was essential in the building of the Panama Canal.


1979Under the terms of the 1977 Carter-Torrijos Treaty, the Panama Railroad was turned over to the Government of Panama in October of 1979


1998Panama privatized the railroad and awarded a 50-year concession to the Panama Canal Railway Company, a joint venture of the Kansas City Southern and Mi-Jack Products, to rebuild and operate the line.

Panama Canal - Class #1COUNT FERDINAND DE LESSEPS

1805, Ferdinand de Lesseps was born at Versailles.

1828, served as vice-consul to Tunis, where his father was consul-general.

1832 , appointed vice-consul at Alexandria.

1833, sent as consul to Cairo, and later given management of the consulate general at Alexandria until 1837.

During this time he went from one city to the other and constantly displayed “admirable zeal and great energy”.

He later retired from the diplomatic service.

French Enterprise ….

Panama Canal - Class #1Said Halim Pasha


In1854, after his accession he gave de Lesseps to opportunity to lead the great enterprise of digging the Suez Canal over the strong opposition of Great Britain.

Wali of Egypt and Sudan,1854 -1863, officially owing fealty to the Ottoman Sultan but in practice exercising virtual independence.

Said was a Francophile, educated in Paris.


The Geographical Society of Paris organized a committee in 1876 to seek international cooperation for studies to fill in gaps in the geographical knowledge of the Central American area for the purpose of building an interoceanic canal.

The committee, La Société Civile Internationale du Canal Interocéanique de Darien, was headed by Ferdinand de Lesseps (74).

In May 1879 a congress of 136 delegates including de Lesseps assembled in the rooms of the Geographical Society in Paris and voted in favor of the creation of a Panama Canal, which was to be without locks, like the Suez Canal.


Geographical Society of Paris, France


Geographical Society of Paris



A rejected plan for a lock canal was submitted by French engineer Baron Godin de Lépinay. Lépinay was known for his intelligence and was the only one among the French delegation with any construction experience in the tropics having worked on railroad construction in Mexico in 1862.

The de Lépinay plan included building dams, one across the Chagres River near its mouth on the Atlantic and another on the Rio Grande near the Pacific. The approximately 80 foot height of the artificial lake thus created would be accessed by locks.

The principal advantages of the plan would be the reduction in the amount of digging that would have to be done and the elimination of flood danger from the Chagres. Estimated construction time was six years.

The de Lépinay design contained most of the basic elements ultimately designed into the current Panama Canal. The French company would use these concepts as a basis for the lock canal concept they would eventually adopt in 1887 following the failure of their sea level attempt.

Had it been adopted at the beginning of 1879, the Panama Canal might well have been completed by the French instead of by the United States!

An Ironic Footnote of History



On December 30, 1879, Ferdinand de Lesseps visited Panama for the first time arriving at Colon (then known as Aspinwall) aboard the Lafayette.

The welcoming ceremonies were held aboard the ship on the Pacific Mail wharf with a little band playing mightily on the dock.

The next morning, the Pacific Mail steamer Colon docks beside the Lafayette, bringing a party of New Yorkers, including stockholders of the railroad, who were to join the tour.

With the little band playing furiously again, the party boarded a train and took off for Panama City on the Pacific Coast.



On January 1, 1880, Ferdinand de Lesseps, his wife Louise-Helene, two of his sons, Mathieu, ten, and Ismael , nine, and one of his 7 daughters, Ferdinande, left Panama City on a tug, along with some one hundred dignitaries, for the mouth of the Rio Grande at La Boca for a ceremony inaugurating the construction of the Panama Canal.

Delays in sailing caused them to arrive at low tide, which prevented them from disembarking. Not one to be discouraged, de Lesseps had a box full of sand brought forth and had his little daughter deliver the first blow with a shiny pickax brought from France for the occasion.

Since the deepest excavation would be the cut through the Continental Divide at Culebra, de Lesseps decided to have another inaugural ceremony there on January 10, 1880.

Officials and guests gathered at Cerro Culebra (later known as Gold Hill), Ferdinande pushed the button of a electric detonator that set off a charge blowing up a small amount of rock and dirt.


De Lesseps left Colon for the United States on February 22, 1880, for the purpose of interesting Americans in the undertaking.

He was received with a great deal of enthusiasm but was unable to dispose of the stock which he had thoughtfully reserved.

Americans were interested in a canal, but not a canal under French control.

He then proceeded on a similar tour of Europe, where he was more successful.

The first issue of stock, 600,000 shares of $100 each, was subscribed twice over, mostly taken in France indicating the great Frenchman's popularity.

In 1888, when the company failed, the total subscriptions, stocks and bond issues, had reached $393,505,100 ($12 billion today).



Phase I 1881- 1882, the entire project was under Couvreux and Hersent.

Armand Réclus, the chief superintendent of the Compagnie Universelle, led the first French construction group of engineers and officials.

Réclus quickly saw that Panama's sparse population did not lend itself to labor recruitment, nor did its thick jungles lend themselves to quick movement through the countryside to accomplish the work.

Gaston Blanchet, Couvreux and Hersent's director, accompanied Réclus to the Isthmus. As Blanchet was known to be the company's driving force, it was a terrible blow when, just 10 months into the project, he died of malaria

Phase II 1883 -1885, following the withdrawal of Couvreux and Hersent, the work was

accomplished by a number of small contractors under supervision of Compagnie Universelle.

Phase III 1886 and 1887 saw the work done by a few large contractors.



Select employees, mainly from France, were treated with extreme generosity. After two years' service, five months vacation, with free traveling expenses to and

from France, were granted. The clerical force worked from 8 to 11 A.M., and 2 to 5 P.M.

Enormous salaries were paid to the directors, engineers, and other officers on the Isthmus and lived in quarters that cost $100,000 with salaries as much as $50,000 a year.

In addition no system of accounting existed to monitor and control expenses.


French Headquarters, Panama City


French Hospitals




By1888, the French labor numbered about 20,000 men.

90 % of these were from islands in the West Indies, such as Jamaica.

European Workers

West Indian Workers


Many who didn't immediately succumb to disease didn't stay long. Among the recruits was French painter Paul Gauguin who arrived with fellow-artist, Charles Laval. For Gauguin, working on the canal was part of a much larger dream, a quick way to finance his transition from the staid stockbroker profession to the uninhibited life of an artist.

The two landed in Panama in April of 1887 at the start of the rainy season and Gauguin began his stint as a laborer. He lasted only two weeks, just long enough to earn enough cash to start an art studio on nearby Isla Taboga and make plans for further adventures. Gauguin’s next stop was the island of St. Martinique.

The Workforce.…


In 1886, De Lesseps takes a party of invited guests, representatives of the chambers of commerce of several French cities, economists, journalists, and others of influence on public opinion in France to Panama in order to report the progress of the undertaking.

The visit is De Lesseps's second and last trip to the Isthmus of Panama.

De Lesseps again predicts that the Panama Canal will be finished by July of 1889.



February, 1886 French engineers conclude that a sea level canal is not possible and

that a lock concept should be considered. De Lesseps resists this notion.

Summer, 1886 After 4 years of excavation, only a

small portion of the required removal for a sea level canal has been accomplished.

January, 1888 De Lesseps hires Gustav Eiffel to

construct locks as a temporary solution while work on the sea level concept proceeds.

December 15, 1888 The Panama Canal Company collapses wiping out the investments of

hundreds of thousands of investors.



In Paris on 4 February 1889, the Tribunal Civil de la Seine lawfully declared bankrupt the Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interoceanique (Panama Canal Company) some 20 years after the opening of the Suez Canal and 10 years after the fateful Congress of delegates assembled at the Geographical Society in Paris.


The lawfully ordered liquidator tried to maintain the completed work, the buildings, the tools and the machinery.

Within a few years, high losses were incurred due to poor means of protection in the damp, humid climatic conditions of Panama.


January 10, 1893 De Lesseps & his son Charles found guilty of fraud and maladministration of the

Panama Canal undertaking. They were both sentenced to five years' imprisonment (neither served any

time) and fined $600. Count Ferdinand de Lesseps died in 1895 at the age of 89 Charles de Lesseps passed away in Paris on October 1, 1923.

Financial loss was estimated at $287,000,000 (almost $9 billion dollars in today’s money).

Cost in lives, according to estimates by the U.S. Isthmian Canal Commission, exceeded 22,000.




Port Fouad Shipyard, Egypt

Casco Viejo, Panama City, Panama

http://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&docid=fnGEDn6LXGfZkM&tbnid=C0sDLCsVPbcfxM:&ved=0CAUQjRw&url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/15006382@N03/2349858959/&ei=zQ95Uo3pHYagsQSjhoH4BQ&bvm=bv.55980276,d.cWc&psig=AFQjCNEyrRmKzg2eYSgmym58um3G24s_AQ&ust=1383751932582264



Panama Canal - Class #1Culebra Cut in 1890, as it was left by the French

The Panama Canal was enveloped in its own "miasmal mist" of failure. Meanwhile in the United States the second Walker Commission (U.S. Isthmian

Canal Commission of 1899-1902 ) ordered by President McKinley, favored a Nicaraguan route.

Panama seemed clothed in defeat, while Nicaragua was regarded as a clean slate for an all-American canal project.

Panama Independence ….



Panama, a Province of Columbia

United States of Columbia

Cristoforo Colombo Cristóbal Colón Christopher Columbus

(Renamed from New Granada,1863)



In 1882, only two years after graduating from Harvard, Theodore Roosevelt made his mark as a military scholar with his book The Naval War of 1812, a detailed analysis of naval combat between the U.S. and Great Britain from 1812-1815.

Roosevelt had long seen the U.S. need to change its naval policy and become a global sea power.


Alfred Thayer Mahan, a Naval officer won fame as a Naval historian and as the leading Naval strategist of his day was called "the most important American strategist of the nineteenth century”.

When Mahan published his famous naval doctrine, "The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783" in 1889, Theodore Roosevelt read the newly published book over a single weekend and never forgot what he learned convinced that the U. S. must protect its sea lanes of interest around the world to become a great nation.

From 1897 to 1898, Roosevelt served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy having been appointed by President William McKinley.

Alfred Thayer Mahan



On February 15, 1898 the USS Maine explodes in Havana Harbor. A total of 274 men were killed. The cause of the explosion is never conclusively established. An initial naval court of inquiry determines that it is the result of a naval mine, and

Spain is blamed.

Panama Independence …. Spanish American War


USS Oregon served for a short time with the Pacific Squadron before being ordered on a voyage around South America to the East Coast in March 1898 in preparation for war with Spain.

Departing San Francisco on March 19th, she reached Jupiter Inlet, Florida 66 days later, a journey of 14,000 nautical miles.

The journey popularized the ship with the American public and demonstrated the security imperative for a shorter route.


After completing her journey the USS Oregon was ordered to join the blockade of Cuba.


September, 1898

The Battle of San Juan Hill, July 1, 1898, also known as the battle for the San Juan Heights, was a decisive battle of the Spanish American War. The San Juan heights was a north-south running elevation just to the east of Santiago de Cuba.

Panama Canal - Class #1Admiral John Grimes Walker


Upon retiring from the Navy in 1897 after a distinguished career, Admiral John G. Walker was chosen by President McKinley to serve as President of the Nicaragua Canal Commission.

In 1899, he was also appointed by President McKinley to head the Isthmian Canal Commission, or the second Walker Commission, to look into possible routes across the Central America.


The Commission favored a Canal in Nicaragua, and actions along those lines were overwhelmingly passed by the U.S. House - Hepburn Act, May 2 of 1900 .


At about this same time, the Compagnie Nouvelle held a stockholders meeting in Paris, and, fearing being left out in the cold determined a new value to their Panama assets of $40,000,000. This just happened to be the value determined by the Americans. Admiral Walker was quoted saying, "It put things on a very different footing." The House, however, passed the Hepburn Bill favoring Nicaragua – two votes short of unanimous.



In September of 1901 President McKinley is assassinated

Supremacy at sea was to become the integral part of future U.S. commercial and military prowess.

Construction of U.S. controlled canal now was an absolute necessity.

Theodore Roosevelt becomes the 26th President of the United States.

Roosevelt summoned the members of the Walker Commission for a closed-door meeting. There he let it be known that he wanted the French offer accepted and that the Commission was to provide a supplementary report unanimously favoring the Panama route.

The Commission prepared the supplementary report reversing its original decision coming out unanimously for a canal thru the Isthmus of Panama!

President Roosevelt submitted the supplementary report to Congress in January 1902. Wisconsin Senator Spooner introduced an amendment to the Hepburn Bill authorizing the president to acquire the French company's assets and concessions for a maximum price of $40,000,000. The bill stated that if arrangements could not be agreed upon between the United States and Colombia within "a reasonable time," the President would be authorized to seek an agreement for the alternate route through Nicaragua.



"An Act to provide for the construction of a canal connecting the waters of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Be it enacted, ... that the President of the United States is hereby authorized to acquire, for and on behalf of the United States, at a cost not exceeding forty millions of dollars, the rights, privileges, franchises, concessions, grants of land, right of way, unfinished work, plants, and other property, real, personal, and mixed, of every name and nature, owned by the New Panama Canal Company, of France, on the Isthmus of Panama.... That the President is hereby authorized to acquire from the Republic of Colombia, for and on behalf of the United States, upon such terms as he may deem reasonable, perpetual control of a strip of land, the territory of the Republic of Colombia, not less than six miles in width, extending from the Caribbean Sea to the Pacific Ocean, and the right to use and dispose of the waters thereon, and to excavate, construct, and to perpetually maintain, operate, and protect thereon a canal..."

Spooner Act, June 28 of 1902



The supporters of the Nicaraguan route in the U.S. Senate cited the massive Lake Nicaragua which drained naturally into the Caribbean Sea. Significant excavation on the Pacific side would required from a height of 184 feet, but this was much less than the 336 feet required for Panama’s Culebra Cut at the Continental Divide.

Those who supported the route through Panama cited many technical reasons already provided in engineering reports. The Panama waterway would be shorter, straighter, take less time to transit, would require fewer locks, had better harbors, already had a railroad, and would cost less to run. As impressive as these factors were they did not sway enough votes in favor of the Panama option.


Mount Momotombo,Nicaragua

But suddenly, geography played a fateful role in where the canal would be built……


Panama Independence …. On May 8 of 1902, Mount Pelee on the Island of

St. Martinique erupted and killed over 30,000 people.

The question of volcanoes in the Nicaraguan canal zone surfaced in Washington but the Nicaraguans sternly denied the presence of any active volcanos.



Mount Momotombo, Nicaragua



Born on July 26, 1859 in Paris, France. Graduated at age 20 from the Ecole Polytechnique, he

remained in France for three years. In 1882 he abandoned his career in public works and traveled to Panama and was employed with de Lessep’s Panama Canal Company.

In World War I, Bunau-Varilla served as an officer in the French army and lost a leg at the Battle of Verdun.

He died in Paris on May 18, 1940, 8 days after the beginning of the German western offensive of WWII.

His wealth was not acquired as an engineer during his first stay working on the first Panama Canal project , nor did he inherit significant wealth from relatives or parents, having been born illegitimate.

He made his fortune during his second stay in Panama from 1886 to 1889, where he ran his own company, Artigue & Sonderegger, together with his brother Maurice.

Philippe Bunau-Varilla


In the spring of 1902, Nicaragua’s Mount Momotombo erupted. The country’s government tried desperately to suppress details of this, but Philippe Bunau-Varilla was on the case. His break came when he spotted in his correspondence a Nicaraguan stamp from two years earlier. Prophetically, it depicted the mighty Momotombo crater, smoking angrily behind Lake Nicaragua.

From a stamp dealer in Washington, Bunau-Varilla purchased 90 copies of the design, which had been used on a set of 14 values from 1-centavo to 5-pesos. He mounted the stamps which were sent individually to every US Senator on June 16th.

Philippe Banau-Varilla


When voting took place three days later, it was 42 to 34 in favor of Panama over Nicaragua.

Most agree that if Mount Pelee and Momotombo had not erupted in the Spring of 1902, the Senate would have voted in favor of the route through Nicaragua.



The Senate approved the Hay-Herran Treaty in January of 1903, offering the Colombian government $10 million in cash and an annual payment of $250,000 for a six-mile-wide strip across the Colombian province of Panama.

In August of 1903 the Colombian senate refused to ratify the treaty, holding out for $25 million.

A whopper of a mistake !!!!

Roosevelt considered this nothing less than a shake-down and he refused to up the ante.


Panama Independence …. November 2, 1903: USS

Nashville arrives off the coast of the Columbian Province of Panama with a contingent of Marines aboard.

U.S. warships blocked sea lanes for possible Colombian troop movements en route to Panama.

Dense jungles blocked Colombia's land routes.

Bribes were paid to get the few Colombian troops in Panama to lay down their arms.

November 3, 1903: Panama declares its independence with a bloodless coup without the firing of one shot.

USS Nashville

August, 1903: Word reaches Washington that a revolution was once again brewing in Panama, and that the terms of the treaty recently rejected by Colombia would be agreeable to the revolutionaries. Roosevelt lets it be known that the U.S. would view this as a positive development and could be counted on to “act accordingly”.


December 2, 1903 Panama approves the Treaty

February 23, 1904 U.S. Senate approves the Treaty.


Philippe Bunau-Varilla

Secretary of StateJohn Milton Hay

November 6, 1903 The United States recognizes Panama

November 11, 1903 Bunau-Varilla, as the diplomatic representative of Panama

(a role he had purchased through financial assistance to the rebels) concluded the Isthmian Canal Convention with Secretary of State John Hay. Bunau-Varilla had not lived in Panama for seventeen years before this, and he never returned. His French citizenship later brought his legitimacy into question by future Panamanian governments.


The rights granted to the U.S. in the Hay-Bunau Varilla Treaty were extensive. They included a grant "in perpetuity of the use, occupation, and control" of a 10 mile wide strip of territory with extensions of 3 nautical miles into the sea from each terminal "for the construction, maintenance, operation, sanitation, and protection" of an Isthmian canal.

Furthermore, the U.S. was entitled to acquire additional areas of land or water necessary for canal operations and held the option of exercising eminent domain in Panama City. Within this territory the U.S. gained "all the rights, powers, and authority which the United States would possess and exercise if it were the sovereign to the entire exclusion" of Panama.

The Republic of Panama became a de facto protectorate of the larger country through two provisions whereby the United States guaranteed the independence of Panama and received in return the right to intervene in Panama's domestic affairs. For the rights it obtained, the United States was to pay the sum of $10 million (about $300 million ) and an annuity, beginning 9 years after ratification, of $250,000 (about $7 million) in gold coin.

The United States also purchased the rights and properties of the French canal company for $40 million ($120 million).



The De Lepinay proposal had been adopted by de Lesseps.

There had not been a rising, dynamic, politician passionately convinced of the need for strong U.S. naval power aided by a passage between the Atlantic & Pacific Oceans.

An assassin’s bullet had not made that politician the President of the United States.

A volcano in Nicaragua had not erupted.The Columbians had not rejected Roosevelt’s

terms to build a canal through the “province” of Panama.

What if………..



Panama Independence …. U.S. "gunboat diplomacy" in Latin America, was the best

illustration of what Theodore Roosevelt meant by the old African adage,

"speak softly and carry a big stick and you will go far”.


Panama Independence …. “Fortunately the opportunity

came at a period when I could act unhampered. Accordingly I took the Isthmus, started the canal and then left Congress not to debate the canal, but to debate me."

"By far the most important action I took in foreign affairs during the time I was President was related to the Panama Canal,"

Ironically, Theodore Roosevelt never saw the completed Panama Canal before he died on January 6, 1919.

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