Name/Title
StereographEntry/Object ID
2023.055.3.0243Description
A black and white stereograph. Image is large ship moving through a canal, several other ships are waiting at the canal entrance. Above the image "T247 (Star)" is printed, below the image "21784T Busy Scene on the Panama Canal - Looking South over Gatun Locks and Gatun Lake Emergency Dam in Position." is printed, to the left of the image "Keystone View Company COPYRIGHTED Manufacturers MADE IN U.S.A. Publishers" is printed, to the right of the image "Meadville, Pa., New York, N. Y., Chicago, Ill., London, England." is printed. On the reverse the following is printed:
21784
A BUSY SCENE ON THE PANAMA CANAL
Panama is a sort of multiple personality; it is at once a country, city, isthumus, bay and canal. It became a Republic in 1903. The folloiwng year Uncle Sam commenced building the canal that linked the Atlantic and Pacific, the task being completed in 1914. Forty thousand men did the work; the coast was $400,000,000. The commanding figure of the project was Col. George W. Goethals.
The Canal Zone is a strip 10 miles wide. It belongs to the Republic of Panama but is controlled by the United States under a perpetual lease. The distance across the isthmus by the canal route is 43 miles.
The French, in 1881, under De Lesseps, the successful builder of the Suez canal, started the building of one across Panama also. A vast amount of work was done but the project failed. Only about one-third of the work done was of value to the Amerian undertaking. The outstanding achievements in teh work were the excavation fo the Gaillard cut, the building of the Gatun dam, and making a tropical jungle sanitary so men could labor and survive.
We look out over the Gatun Lake and in the foreground see a steamer in the uppermost of the three Gatun locks, 85 feet above the ocean channel. The locks are in pairs, so vessels can pass each other traveling in opposite directions, one going up while the other goes down. On either side of the steamer are three towing engines, those forward used for pulling, and those aft to keep the ship from gaining too much momentum and thus doing damage to the lock gates. In the empty locks to the left we see an emergency dam in position which can readily be sung into place in case the lock gates should fail to operate.
Copyrigth by The Keystone View CompanyCollection
Photograph Collection