The Path Between the Seas
★★★★★
Expertly researched and engagingly written, as all McCullough has been for me so far.
Key takeaways:
- Ferdinand de Lesseps was a proto-Elon Musk/Tesla in some ways, incredibly popular, history of impressive achievement (Suez), pioneered popular share buying in his new endeavor for Panama, habitual over-promiser.
- The US once again brought about a revolution in a foreign country to suit their own ends (split of Panama from Columbia). But in this case it seems it was entirely unnecessary had the proper diplomatic channels been followed and the US not been convinced to care about the details on the French canal company’s financial obligations to Columbia by extra-state actors.
- Some interesting factoids about the growing understanding of diseases and how the American effort was able to mostly combat this pitfall whereas the French just suffered through it.
- The extremely rigid and racially determined caste system of the workers in the American effort, the tremendous disregard for black lives. Although at the same time Caribbean workers really had no better options for work at the time. I do wish he’d gone into this a little deeper, considering the more contemporary discussions going on. Ultimately it’s clear the canal would not have been built without abundant cheap labor supplied predominantly by black people.
- How the project was completed within schedule and on budget despite some significant setbacks, particularly from slides filling in the cut. The picture he paints is that once the apparatus got set up it was almost a college campus like environment for the white workers. Young professionals with good wages, free housing, cheap company stores, numerous clubs and social organizations. All united in a glorious mission to unite the seas and put a feather in the cap of America. In some ways the lifestyle sounds similar to what the Google or Dropbox campuses might be, well paid young professionals, catered meals, a very structured lifestyle. The book mentions there was some discussion of this being an example of socialism at the time, which it dismisses as not totally accurate. My personal takeaway focuses more on the unified vision for the project that seems to have been extremely motivating for almost everyone working on it, even down to the day laborers. This isn’t something you come across all that often.
- It’s also kind of fascinating that all the mechanical bits, the locks, control systems etc., seem to still be basically the same to this day. In some brief research afterwards I learned that additional channels and lock systems were built around 2016 to allow for larger boats, but the main channels are still in use and I believe with pretty much the same systems as constructed in 1913. Which is pretty impressive.
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