Chapter One The First Attempt The men forced their way through the tropical undergrowth It was hot and humid Some slapped at mosquitoes Others were so weak they could barely walk What were they doing in the jungles of Panama It was 1880 and the men were there to build a canal People had been dreaming of this project for centuries More than 350 years earlier Vasco Nuñez de Balboa traveled across Panama after hearing stories about a great body of water In September 1513 Balboa reached the Pacific Ocean He claimed it for Spain It was not long before people talked of building a waterway to link the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific in the west Panama is located on a strip of land called an isthmus At the narrowest point the two oceans are only 50 miles 80 kilometers apart Explorers found dense jungles when they first visited Panama ﱚ5ﱚ
Magellan Ferdinand Magellan a Portuguese explorer reached the Pacific Ocean in the winter of 1519 to 1520 He was the first to do so by sailing around the southern tip of South America Without such a waterway reaching the Pacific Ocean from Europe was difficult Ships had to travel around the tip of South America The voyage was long and dangerous Still centuries passed without anyone building a canal In 1849 a group of U S businessmen built a railroad across the isthmus Ships took passengers and freight to the east coast of Panama Trains carried the people and goods across the isthmus Then other ships finished the voyage to ports on the Pacific Ocean Building the railroad proved to be difficult and expensive However by 1855 the trains were running The idea of a canal was not forgotten Another canal the Suez opened in 1869 This canal linked the Red and the Mediterranean seas through Egypt a country in northern Africa A Frenchman named Ferdinand de Lesseps was responsible for building the Suez Canal Now Lesseps wanted to build a canal in Central America ﱚ6ﱚ
Explorer Vasco Nuñez de Balboa crossed the Panama isthmus to the Pacific Ocean in 1513 Ferdinand de Lesseps made the first attempt to build a canal across Panama The Paris Geographical Society set up a committee to study the idea Lesseps led the committee French engineers went to Central America to study and map the land At the time Panama belonged to the country of Colombia which was created when Spain gave up its empire Before a canal could be built France needed approval from the Colombian government In 1878 France was given the right to build a canal along the route of the Panama Railroad In 1879 the world’s best engineers held a conference Some argued that the canal should be built in Nicaragua ﱚ7ﱚ
