Panama Canal

===Early proposals in Panama===
[[File:Panama.A2003087.1850.250m.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|Satellite image showing the location of the Panama Canal: dense jungles are visible in green, topped by clouds.]]

The earliest record regarding a canal across the Isthmus of Panama was in 1534, when [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles V]], [[Holy Roman Emperor]] and King of Spain, ordered a survey for a route through the Americas in order to ease the voyage for ships traveling between Spain and Peru. The Spanish were seeking to gain a military advantage over the Portuguese.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.pancanal.com/eng/history/history/index.html |title=A History of the Panama Canal: French and American Construction Efforts |publisher=Panama Canal Authority |access-date=2007-09-03 |archive-date=December 15, 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141215060157/http://www.pancanal.com/eng/history/history/index.html |url-status=dead}}; Chapter 3, ''[http://www.pancanal.com/eng/history/history/early.html Some Early Canal Plans] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150102032703/http://www.pancanal.com/eng/history/history/early.html |date=January 2, 2015 |url-status=dead}}''</ref>

In 1668, the English physician and philosopher Sir [[Thomas Browne]] speculated in his encyclopedic work, ''[[Pseudodoxia Epidemica]],'' that "some Isthmus have been eaten through by the Sea, and others cut by the spade: And if the policy would permit, that of Panama in America were most worthy the attempt: it being but few miles over, and would open a shorter cut unto the East Indies and China".<ref>{{cite book |section=Book 6, chapter 8 |title=On the River Nile |edition=4th |year=1668 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aOI_AQAAMAAJ |last1=Browne |first1=Sir Thomas |author-link=Thomas Browne |access-date=January 10, 2022 |archive-date=November 19, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211119062425/https://books.google.com/books?id=aOI_AQAAMAAJ |url-status=live}}</ref>

Given the strategic location of Panama, and the potential of its narrow isthmus separating two great oceans, other trade links in the area were attempted over the years. One early example of this was ill-fated [[Darien scheme]], launched by the [[Kingdom of Scotland]] in 1698 to set up an overland trade route. Generally inhospitable conditions thwarted the effort, and it was abandoned in April 1700.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.kinnaird.net/darien.htm|title=Darien Expedition|access-date=2007-09-03|archive-date=July 19, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110719173435/http://www.kinnaird.net/darien.htm|url-status=live}}</ref> In 1788, Americans suggested that the Spanish should build the canal, since they controlled the colonies where it would be built. They said that this would be a less treacherous route for ships than going around the southern tip of South America, and that tropical ocean currents would naturally widen the canal after construction.<ref>{{cite book|title=Meteorology in America, 1800–1870|author=James Rodger Fleming|page=4|publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press|date=1990|isbn=0801839580}}</ref> During an expedition from 1788 to 1793, [[Alessandro Malaspina]] outlined plans for construction of a canal.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Caso |first=Adolph |url=http://archive.org/details/theytoomadeameri00caso |title=They too made America great |date=1978 |publisher=Boston : Branden Press |others=Internet Archive |isbn=978-0-8283-1714-6 |pages=72}}</ref>

Numerous canals were built in other countries in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The success of the [[Erie Canal]] through central [[New York (state)|New York]] in the United States in the 1820s and the collapse of the [[Spanish Empire]] in Latin America resulted in growing American interest in building an inter-oceanic canal. Beginning in 1826, US officials began negotiations with [[Gran Colombia]] (present-day Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Panama), hoping to gain a concession to build a canal. Jealous of their newly gained independence and fearing domination by the more powerful United States, president [[Simón Bolívar]] and [[Republic of New Granada|New Granada]] officials declined American offers. After the collapse of Gran Colombia, New Granada remained unstable under constant government intrigue.{{Citation needed|date=August 2020}}

Great Britain attempted to develop a canal in 1843. According to the ''[[New-York Tribune|New-York Daily Tribune]]'', August 24, 1843, [[Barings Bank]] of London and the [[Republic of New Granada]] entered into a contract for the construction of a canal across the [[Isthmus of Darien]] (Isthmus of Panama). They referred to it as the Atlantic and Pacific Canal, and it was a wholly British endeavor. Projected for completion in five years, the plan was never carried out. At nearly the same time, other ideas were floated, including a canal (and/or a railroad) across Mexico's [[Isthmus of Tehuantepec]]. That did not develop, either.<ref>[http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030213/1843-08-24/ed-1/seq-/#date1=1836&index=1&rows=20&words=Lexington+Ship+ship&searchType=basic&sequence=0&state=New+York&date2=1850&proxtext=lexington+ship&y=10&x=16&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1)]{{Dead link|date=June 2019}}</ref>

In 1846, the [[Mallarino–Bidlack Treaty]], negotiated between the US and New Granada, granted the United States transit rights and the right to intervene militarily in the isthmus. In 1848, the [[California Gold Rush|discovery of gold in California]], on the West Coast of the United States, generated renewed interest in a canal crossing between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. [[William Henry Aspinwall]], who had won the federal subsidy to build and operate the Pacific mail steamships at around the same time, benefited from the gold discovery. Aspinwall's route included steamship legs from New York City to Panama, and from Panama to California, with an overland portage through Panama. This route with an overland leg in Panama was soon frequently traveled, as it provided one of the fastest connections between San Francisco, California, and the [[East Coast of the United States|East Coast]] cities, about 40 days' transit in total. Nearly all the gold that was shipped out of California went by the fast Panama route. Several new and larger paddle steamers were soon plying this new route, including private steamship lines owned by American entrepreneur [[Cornelius Vanderbilt]] that made use of an overland route through Nicaragua, and the unfortunate [[SS Central America|SS ''Central America'']].<ref>{{cite book|title=The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt|first=T.J.|last=Stiles|date=2009|publisher=Knopf |isbn=9780375415425}}</ref>{{page needed|date=August 2020}}

[[File:Admiralty Chart No 657 Isthmus of Panama Showing The Proposed Panama Canal and the Railway . . . , Published 1885.jpg|thumb|left|upright=1.1|Map showing the Railway and the proposed Panama Canal route]]
In 1850, the United States began construction of the [[Panama Canal Railway|Panama Railroad]] (now called the Panama Railway) to cross the isthmus; it opened in 1855. This overland link became a vital piece of Western Hemisphere infrastructure, greatly facilitating trade. The later canal route was constructed parallel to it, as it had helped clear dense forests.{{Citation needed|date=August 2020}} An all-water route between the oceans was still the goal. In 1855, [[William Kennish]], a [[Isle of Man|Manx]]-born engineer working for the United States government, surveyed the isthmus and issued a report on a route for a proposed Panama Canal.<ref name=mw>{{Cite book |author=A.W. Moore |date=1901 |entry-url=http://www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook/fulltext/worthies/p118.htm |title=Manx Worthies or Biographies of Notable Manx Men and Women |entry=William Kennish (b. 1799, d. 1862) |page=118 |location=Douglas, Isle of Man |publisher=S. K. Broadbent |via=isle-of-man.com |access-date=February 8, 2010 |archive-date=June 28, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150628225110/http://www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook/fulltext/worthies/p118.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> His report was published as a book entitled ''The Practicability and Importance of a Ship Canal to Connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans''.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rAwsAAAAYAAJ |title=The Practicability and Importance of a Ship Canal to Connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans |last1=Kelley |first1=Frederick M. |last2=Kennish |first2=William |last3=Serrell |first3=Edward Wellman |year=1855 |access-date=February 27, 2016 |archive-date=July 28, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200728094150/https://books.google.com/books?id=rAwsAAAAYAAJ |url-status=live }}</ref>{{page needed|date=August 2020}}

[[File:Aktie Canal de Panama 1880.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Share of the Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interocéanique de Panama, issued 29. November 1880 – signed by Ferdinand de Lesseps]]

In 1876, [[Lucien Napoléon Bonaparte-Wyse|Lucien Napoléon Bonaparte Wyse]] and his chief assistant Armand Réclus, both officers and engineers of the [[French Navy]], explored several routes in the Darien-Atrato regions and made proposals including the construction of tunnels and locks.<ref name="Reclus">{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wmwYAAAAYAAJ |first=Gérard |last=Fauconnier |title=Panama: Armand Reclus et le canal océans |publisher=University of Virginia reprint in French Panama Atlantica |year=2004 |isbn=9782843946684 |access-date=January 10, 2022 |archive-date=October 25, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211025161009/https://books.google.com/books?id=wmwYAAAAYAAJ |url-status=live }}</ref>{{page needed|date=August 2020}} A second Isthmian exploratory visit began on December 6, 1877, where two routes were explored in Panama, the San Blas route and a route from Limon Bay to Panama City, the current Canal route. The French had achieved success in building the [[Suez Canal]] in the Middle East. While it was a lengthy project, they were encouraged to plan for a canal to cross the Panamanian isthmus.{{sfn |McCullough |1977 |pp=58–59}} Wyse went to Bogotá and on March 20, 1878, signed a treaty, in the name of the ''Société civile internationale du Canal interocéanique par l'isthme du Darien'' headed by general Étienne Türr, with the Colombian government, known as the Wyse concession, to build an interoceanic canal through Panama.
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