The French Era
The French Era
1880
The building of the Panama Canal symbolically begins under the direction of French diplomat Ferdinand de Lesseps. Actual construction begins a year later.
Count de Lesseps was a hero in France as the principal director of the Suez Canal. Because of his success in the Suez, de Lesseps thinks that a similar sea level canal can be built in Panama, not accounting for the differences in the tides between the Pacific and the Atlantic. This proves to be a major error in judgment.
1881
The Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interoceanique is incorporated under French law.
1882
30,000 West Indians hired by the French to work on the Canal.
1884
Philippe Bunau-Varilla, a French engineer, goes to Panama to work on the canal being constructed under Ferdinand de Lesseps.
1887
The French cut a 74-ft wide swath through the jungle largely by hand. The high point in their effort is in 1887-1888, when 17,885 workers remove some 15,000,000 cubic yards of earth per year.
1889
Ferdinand de Lesseps abandons his Panama Canal project. Over 5,000 French people die working on the project. In all, over 25,000 people die during eight years of work, mostly from malaria and yellow fever.
On Feb 4 Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interoceanique is declared bankrupt and dissolved by Tribunal Civil de la Seine.
1894
Philippe Bunau-Varilla becomes a major stockholder and spokesman in the Compagnie Nouvelle du Canal de Panama. He then offers to sell the company’s assets to the US for $109 million and later reduces the price to $40 million.
1904
The United States buys the equipment and infrastructure from France.
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