Excavations for the Panama Canal began in 1879 under an agreement between France and Colombia. After tropical diseases ravaged the Panamanian and Jamaican workforce, France withdrew and offered the project––including surveys, equipment, buildings, and a railroad—to the U.S. for a relatively low price. The offer influenced Congress to select Panama as the canal site.
Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress
“Spanish laborers at work in Culebra Cut,” stereograph, August 1914
The Panama Canal
By the 1880s Congress considered a canal connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans necessary for commerce and defense, but disagreements about its location stalled any action. Then the USS Maine exploded in Cuba. The battleship USS Oregon, stationed on the West Coast, took two months to reach the Caribbean to provide support in the Spanish-American War. The long voyage convinced Congress that a canal was imperative. In 1902 Congress authorized the purchase of a project initiated by France on land owned by Colombia, to complete construction of the Panama Canal.
I want . . . a bill to be passed here under which we will get a canal. There never was greater need for it than now. The Oregon demonstrated [that] to our people.
Senator John Spooner of Wisconsin, Speech to the U.S. Senate, June 18, 1902
Excavations for the Panama Canal began in 1879 under an agreement between France and Colombia. After tropical diseases ravaged the Panamanian and Jamaican workforce, France withdrew and offered the project––including surveys, equipment, buildings, and a railroad—to the U.S. for a relatively low price. The offer influenced Congress to select Panama as the canal site.
Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress
