Description
Cheered on by President Teddy Roosevelt, U.S. engineers and construction workers braved a deathtrap of Yellow Fever, Malaria, mudslides, and torrential rains to slice through 50 miles of jungle and solid rock and open a waterway from the Atlantic to the Pacific in 1914. The project cost $375 million, took 12 years to complete, and saved about 7,800 miles sailing from New York to San Francisco. The U.S. succeeded where the French had failed and had lost more than 2 billion Francs and at least 23,000 lives. Today a ship can pass between the Atlantic and Pacific in less than 12 hours.
