Panama Canal: The Eighth Wonder of the World

R.M. Koster:
The Spaniards thought that if they did dig a canal, God would punish them for it. And this argument got a lot of ridicule during the last century and the first part of this one, but it doesn't seem to me much different from the fears we're beginning to have nowadays about the dangers of messing with nature.

Narrator:
The Spaniards left no canal in Panama, but the Royal Road survived-wide enough for two mules to cross between the port cities. Then in 1848, there is borne a new, compelling reason to cross Panama as quickly as possible. On the California frontier, a prospector discovers something glittering in the stream bed at a place called Sutter's Mill. The Gold Rush is on. Americans leaving from the East Coast can cross the United States on horse or by foot. It is an arduous trek through hostile territory. A journey to be avoided at all cost. Many gold rushers choose to go by sea-a 13,000 mile journey around South America's infamous Cape Horn, but fortune hunters willing to risk the unknown go by way of Panama and shave 8000 miles off the trip. They anchor off the Atlantic coast and row up the Chagres River as far as Gamboa. They finish crossing to the Pacific side on foot, following the old Spanish trail into the jungle. But navigating the dense rain forest proves close to impossible. Most of them barely survive.

Gold miner:
[in a letter home] I have no time to give reasons, but in saying it, I utter the united sentiment of every passenger whom I have heard speak. It is this, and I say it in fear of God and the love of Man. "To one and all-for no consideration come this route".

Narrator:
They speak of broiling heat and blinding rain, and of unknown fevers that cause men to drop in their tracks. These are the first of many omens. Panama will not be tamed easily.

Narrator:
In 1850, the difficulty of crossing Panama on foot prompts New York financiers to begin building a railroad. Right from the outset, the country resists civilization. Solid ground to build on is hard to find. Panama's terrain is a mixture of massive quicksands & swamps. Working conditions for railroad laborers are terrible. The country is cursed with disease & swarming with mosquitoes. And the men begin to die. Cholera, Malaria, Dysentery, fever and Smallpox. Diseases that seem to seep from the jungle without cause or cure.

F. N. Otis, Railroad Surveyor:
We were in the densest jungle, reeking with Malaria. And abounding with almost every species of wild beast, noxious reptile and venomous insects known in the tropics.

Narrator:
The human cost is extraordinary. Legend has it that there is a dead man for every railroad tie between the Pacific & Atlantic coast. At least 6000 people will die during the construction of the railroad-a number that will pale in comparison to what lay ahead.

R.M. Koster:
The highest elevation at Suez was 50 feet above sea level. Here, it was 330 feet, and that translated into millions and millions of cubic yards of dirt to be removed. At Suez, you had mostly sand. Here, you have rock and, what was worse, mud. The mud was terrible here; The more you dug out, the more slid in.

R.M. Koster:
The last thing people want to give up is their illusions. They'll give up their money before they'll give up their illusions. Nobody wanted to say..."We lost this one". De Lesseps didn't want to admit it, the government didn't want to admit it, the French shareholders didn't want to admit it. Nobody wanted to come to the conclusion that "Hey, this won't work".

Narrator:
[after the French Canal Company declares bankruptcy] 800,000 shareholders, mostly from the low & middle income range, lose every franc of their investment.

Philippe Calon:
The French reacted strongly. Those who invested reacted strongly. Today still, I know people to whom you cannot mention De Lesseps. They say "My family lost everything in Panama".

Narrator:
Bunau-Varilla flaunts his influence by appointing himself Panama's Ambassador to the United States. He immediately begins negotiating with the Secretary of State for the agreement allowing the U.S. to build the Panama Canal.

R.M. Koster:
He was so interested in getting the money, getting the 40 million dollars that the U.S. had agreed to pay for a bunch of rotting equipment, for works that mostly were never used, that he thought up everything the United States could possibly want in a treaty and then put in some order. As, for example, a clause that gave the United States perpetual sovereignty - until the Sun goes out, till the stars stop shining - over 500 square miles of Panama's territory.

Narrator:
Meanwhile, Dr. Manuel Amador, now President of Panama, arrives in Washington thinking he is going to make a deal for the canal. He is dismayed to find out that the treaty is already done. When the treaty is signed, the French Canal Company receives forty million dollars - most of which disappears into the pockets of Bunau-Varilla. The country of Panama gets ten million dollars. The Colombians get nothing. Many Americans are appalled, but Roosevelt dismisses his critics and pronounces it the duty of the United States to support nationalist uprisings. Roosevelt wins his isthmus, and Bunau-Varilla takes credit for avenging the honor of France.

Philippe-Jean Bunau-Varilla:
I had fulfilled my mission. The mission I had taken on myself. I had safeguarded the work of French genius. I had served France.

Thomas Goethals:
[referring to engineer John Frank Stevens] His most remarkable contribution was that he decided that the most important problem facing anyone attempting to dig the canal was what you did with the spoil. That is, the earth, the dirt that you took. What did you do with it?

Narrator:
Stevens carefully plans an innovative track layout for disposing of the immense amounts of excavated soil. He devises a railroad system that becomes the backbone of all canal operations. Within a year, crews have completely rebuilt the line with heavier rails that can withstand the enormous loads. The cornerstone of success is double-tracking. Trains can run virtually nonstop in both directions the entire width of the isthmus. More efficient trains mean harder-working steam shovels.

Thomas Goethals:
They were moving constantly - 160 a day through the Culebra Cut. taking spoil out while it was being dug. As many as 67 of these steam shovels at work during the height of the Culebra Cut excavation.

Narrator:
The Americans would ultimately dig out more than 230 million cubic yards of earth from the bed of the canal. In the nine-mile stretch of the Culebra Cut, the dense, unstable passage through the mountains, cars full of rock and soil run a continuous circuit on the main line of the railroad. At the dumping ground, a 3-ton steel plow pulled by a winch unloads the entire 20-car train in a single sweep - all in about ten minutes. The unloader does alone what used to take 300 men. The simple act of turning the Panama Railroad into a conveyor belt is a turning point for the entire effort.

Narrator:
Finally, on May 20, 1913, steam shovel 222 and 230 meet at the bottom of Culebra Cut. The digging is over. The last concrete is laid at the locks ten days later. For thousands of men, the end of the most important work of their lives is fast approaching.

S.P. Verner:
[in his memoirs] We have seen men grow down here, as well as concrete walls and mighty iron structures. They see how great the work of their hands has made them into men. Whose life on earth is hardly to be found elsewhere. How they have fought the greatest battle of peacetime to a finish and stand now wondering somewhat, how they did it?

Narrator:
In September, another milestone is reached. Culebra Cut is filled with water from Gatun Lake. There remains just one stretch of earth that prevents the canal from being continuous. When a temporary dike at Gamboa is blown up, the Culebra Cut is joined to Gatun lake. A few days later, the first water enters Miraflores Locks on the Pacific side. On August 15, 1914, the USS Ancon makes the first complete passage through the canal in 9 hours and 40 minutes. Transit through the waterway is officially open to the world. A dream of the ages has become a reality. The canal is finished - under budget and ahead of schedule. So well-planned was the fundamental design of the Panama Canal, and the operation of its locks, that for the next 85 years they remain unchanged. Since the canal opened, it has seen 700,000 vessels pass by. It has profoundly influenced the movement of people & the fortunes of the world. The Panama Canal has indeed united the globe. Just as the Spanish, the French and the Americans had wanted for 400 years. Although Theodore Roosevelt never saw the canal, his words echo in its completion.

President Theodore Roosevelt:
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much, nor suffer much. Because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory or defeat.

Epilogue text:
For the next sixty-three years, the United States continued to operate the Panama Canal. In 1977, the U.S. decided to turn over the canal to the Republic of Panama. At noon on December 31, 1999, the transfer will take place.

Narrator:
The dream of joining the Atlantic & Pacific Oceans with a canal first came to light in the 16th Century. Spanish explorer Vasco Nunez de Balboa had just hacked his way through Panama's treacherous Darien jungle and gazed upon the Pacific Ocean. Suddenly, a new vision of the world emerged. A narrow strip of land, the Isthmus of Panama, was the only barrier between the two great oceans. Panama's geography would be its destiny.