The Panama Canal is one of the very few modern endeavors that has changed the Face of the planet on which we live. The Panama Canal should be known as the eighth wonder of the world. It split a continent and connected the world as no other man made creation ever had. Despite previous failures by other country's, the US was able to conquer the many dangers of the canal area and build what still is one of the greatest engineering marvels of the world.
             The US was not the first country to try to create a passage through the Panama area. People as far back as Columbus have searched for a such passage. French Emperor Napoleon III had toyed with the idea of building a canal on France's land across the sea but never really started a major push for it.
             The first major attempt to build a canal came from a Frenchman named Ferdinand de Lesseps. He was very confident he could accomplish in making the passage from previous canal projects. He sold stock in his company the Compagnie Universalle du Canal Interoceanique to finance the endeavor. However he only netted eight percent of what he was going to need to finance the canal project. He ended up with 40 million francs instead of the 400 million that he hoped for. Work began in 1882 along the route of the 1855 Panama Railroad. The company was plagued with financial problems basically from the day it started. Lesseps was forced to go back to France several times to get funds. Other major problems included disease, which killed or made many of the workers deathly ill, and the rocky terrain which proved to be too much for the French steam shovels to handle. In 1889 Lesseps' company liquidated to pay back investors and banks.
             The US was now interested in building the canal. The Spooner Act gave the president {Teddy Roosevelt}40 million dollars to purchase the New Panama Canal Company, and the power to negotiate a treaty with Colombia. Buying the company for 40 million dollars was easy but a trea...