1 00:00:17,050 --> 00:00:19,917 1914. 2 00:00:20,053 --> 00:00:23,045 The Panama Canal is completed. 3 00:00:23,189 --> 00:00:26,454 The Atlantic and the Pacifiic are joined. 4 00:00:31,197 --> 00:00:36,225 The most ambitious construction project since the great pyramids of Egypt. 5 00:00:36,369 --> 00:00:38,837 The work has spanned nearly half a century, 6 00:00:38,972 --> 00:00:42,533 and claimed the lives of 25 thousand men and women. 7 00:00:46,679 --> 00:00:50,672 Now it is fimished and the world is suddenly smaller. 8 00:00:58,391 --> 00:01:00,120 But behind this epic tale, 9 00:01:00,260 --> 00:01:03,525 there is another story of two unsung heroes. 10 00:01:05,565 --> 00:01:10,662 One is an engineer from the Rockies with the vision to move mountains. 11 00:01:10,804 --> 00:01:13,796 The other, a soft spoken Alabama physician 12 00:01:13,940 --> 00:01:18,968 whose enemies are ignorance, disease and death. 13 00:01:19,112 --> 00:01:25,483 Together, they take on a wilderness that had defeated the best engineers in the world. 14 00:01:25,618 --> 00:01:30,920 Without either one, the Panama Canal could not be built. 15 00:01:31,057 --> 00:01:32,547 And yet, one of these visionaries 16 00:01:32,692 --> 00:01:35,388 will suddenly and mysteriously walk away 17 00:01:35,528 --> 00:01:37,621 before the canal is fimished. 18 00:01:37,764 --> 00:01:41,097 And take the secret of his departure to his grave. 19 00:02:27,580 --> 00:02:31,641 The Republic of Panama, Central America. 20 00:02:31,784 --> 00:02:34,048 A barricade between two oceans. 21 00:02:34,187 --> 00:02:37,122 With a blanket of jungle. And a spine of mountains. 22 00:02:47,233 --> 00:02:52,899 Today, 14,000 ships sail through these peaks and forests each year. 23 00:02:58,912 --> 00:03:01,608 Their miracle highway is the Panama Canal. 24 00:03:01,748 --> 00:03:07,050 50 miles long. One of the wonders of the modern world. 25 00:03:07,187 --> 00:03:10,782 A miracle that, on a rain soaked day in July, 1905, 26 00:03:10,924 --> 00:03:14,155 no one in Panama would have believed possible. 27 00:03:31,778 --> 00:03:34,542 At the port of Colon, a new American fiield boss has 28 00:03:34,681 --> 00:03:38,412 arrived to take control of a dying dream. 29 00:03:44,257 --> 00:03:48,284 At age 52, John Stevens has built more miles of railroad than 30 00:03:48,428 --> 00:03:50,555 any other engineer in the world. 31 00:03:57,303 --> 00:03:59,203 The Rocky Mountains have been his home. 32 00:03:59,339 --> 00:04:03,332 And spanning them his greatest challenge until now. 33 00:04:12,852 --> 00:04:16,344 In Panama, yellow fever has killed hundreds of workers, 34 00:04:16,489 --> 00:04:21,620 most of them from the West Indies, and terrifiied the rest. 35 00:04:21,761 --> 00:04:24,457 The men call it The Great Scare. 36 00:04:37,810 --> 00:04:43,749 But his orders come directly from the President of the United States. 37 00:04:43,883 --> 00:04:45,578 In his fiirst address to Congress 38 00:04:45,718 --> 00:04:48,881 Roosevelt vows to chop the Isthmus of Panama in half 39 00:04:49,022 --> 00:04:51,718 and complete The Big Ditch. 40 00:04:55,528 --> 00:04:58,861 "We must build the Isthmian Canal... 41 00:04:58,998 --> 00:05:02,900 No single great material work which remains to be undertaken 42 00:05:03,036 --> 00:05:05,903 on this continent is of such consequence 43 00:05:06,039 --> 00:05:08,405 to the American people." 44 00:05:10,977 --> 00:05:18,213 Roosevelt's motives are patriotic, economic and military. 45 00:05:18,351 --> 00:05:21,115 A canal would trim nearly a month from the travel time 46 00:05:21,254 --> 00:05:25,088 between New York and San Francisco. 47 00:05:25,224 --> 00:05:28,318 Making the shortest path between the oceans a superhighway 48 00:05:28,461 --> 00:05:29,894 of American commerce 49 00:05:30,029 --> 00:05:33,931 and the lifeline of the nation's burgeoning two ocean Navy. 50 00:05:39,172 --> 00:05:42,437 Roosevelt inspires thousands of young American laborers 51 00:05:42,575 --> 00:05:45,874 to set off for Panama. 52 00:05:46,012 --> 00:05:48,606 But they disembark in a steaming hell. 53 00:05:53,419 --> 00:05:55,011 Soaring heat... 54 00:05:58,191 --> 00:05:59,488 punishing rains... 55 00:06:01,661 --> 00:06:03,128 ancient jungles. 56 00:06:07,834 --> 00:06:14,296 Temperatures top 130 and it can rain daily for eight months. 57 00:06:20,613 --> 00:06:21,910 In the unbroken forests, 58 00:06:22,048 --> 00:06:25,245 lethal predators await the innocent arrivals. 59 00:06:34,327 --> 00:06:37,592 But the most mortal dangers are too small to see 60 00:06:45,338 --> 00:06:47,306 Confused, chaotic, and deadly. 61 00:06:47,440 --> 00:06:50,671 Teddy Roosevelt's Big Ditch Project is a quagmire 62 00:06:50,810 --> 00:06:55,543 sucking up millions of dollars, and hundreds of lives. 63 00:06:55,681 --> 00:06:58,115 To slice through the bureaucratic nightmare, 64 00:06:58,251 --> 00:07:01,812 Roosevelt authorizes John Stevens to ignore any orders 65 00:07:01,954 --> 00:07:04,354 that do not come directly from the White House. 66 00:07:04,490 --> 00:07:05,650 Stevens agrees. 67 00:07:05,792 --> 00:07:08,124 And he advises the much younger president 68 00:07:08,261 --> 00:07:11,822 to keep his promise. 69 00:07:11,964 --> 00:07:14,057 I'm to have a free hand. 70 00:07:14,200 --> 00:07:17,658 I'm not to be hampered or handicapped by anyone high or low. 71 00:07:17,804 --> 00:07:23,504 And I'm to stay on the Isthmus only until success is assured. 72 00:07:25,878 --> 00:07:28,972 It is no accident that Stevens has been recruited. 73 00:07:29,115 --> 00:07:31,481 For the Canal to succeed, it must fiind a way 74 00:07:31,617 --> 00:07:33,744 through the mountains of the Continental Divide, 75 00:07:33,886 --> 00:07:37,185 the backbone connecting North and South America. 76 00:07:37,323 --> 00:07:40,224 Roosevelt hopes America's greatest railway man 77 00:07:40,359 --> 00:07:44,989 can save his Canal and ensure his political future. 78 00:07:51,237 --> 00:07:55,003 Stevens is a railroad man, not a Washington insider. 79 00:07:56,676 --> 00:07:59,304 Day after day he tramps through the construction zone, 80 00:07:59,445 --> 00:08:02,039 focused on every detail of the job. 81 00:08:05,184 --> 00:08:10,451 His cigars are so enormous that the men call him "The Big Smoke." 82 00:08:10,590 --> 00:08:12,683 But they respect him immediately. 83 00:08:12,825 --> 00:08:15,350 Finally, they have a boss who will listen. 84 00:08:17,163 --> 00:08:20,394 "Mr. Stevens did not talk much but asked questions 85 00:08:20,533 --> 00:08:23,696 and could that man ask questions! 86 00:08:23,836 --> 00:08:25,463 He found out everything I knew. 87 00:08:25,605 --> 00:08:29,063 He turned me inside out and shook out the last drop of information." 88 00:08:29,208 --> 00:08:32,439 Frank Maltby, Division Head 89 00:08:35,114 --> 00:08:39,016 After decades of back breaking labor, workers have slashed a route 90 00:08:39,151 --> 00:08:41,415 through the jungle that the canal is to follow. 91 00:08:43,523 --> 00:08:46,424 By 1905, excavation is concentrated 92 00:08:46,559 --> 00:08:49,392 in a mountainous area of the Continental Divide. 93 00:08:54,500 --> 00:08:56,968 Stevens is appalled at what he fiinds. 94 00:08:59,939 --> 00:09:06,071 Trains lie rusting off their tracks. Steam shovels lay idle. 95 00:09:06,212 --> 00:09:12,117 Workers have no blueprints, no guidance, no hope. 96 00:09:12,251 --> 00:09:15,049 "I believe I faced about as discouraging a proposition 97 00:09:15,187 --> 00:09:18,850 as was ever presented to a construction engineer. 98 00:09:18,991 --> 00:09:23,360 I found no organization... no answerable heads... 99 00:09:23,496 --> 00:09:26,021 Nobody was working but the ants and the typists." 100 00:09:32,204 --> 00:09:35,833 In Panama, it has been this way for more than 30 years. 101 00:09:35,975 --> 00:09:41,072 For the Americans now; for the French in the 1880s. 102 00:09:41,213 --> 00:09:44,444 Having succeeded at linking Europe and the Orient by building 103 00:09:44,584 --> 00:09:46,552 the great Suez canal in Egypt, 104 00:09:46,686 --> 00:09:52,056 the French try to repeat their success in Central America. 105 00:09:52,191 --> 00:09:56,252 They believe that slender Panama should be an easy target. 106 00:09:59,131 --> 00:10:01,463 It is a fatal miscalculation. 107 00:10:16,349 --> 00:10:22,049 Disease, accidents, and exhaustion take the lives of 22,000 laborers. 108 00:10:29,495 --> 00:10:33,761 One man must succeed where the world's best have failed. 109 00:10:38,471 --> 00:10:41,133 Workers tell The Big Smoke that their greatest worry 110 00:10:41,273 --> 00:10:42,900 is the treacherous Culebra Cut, 111 00:10:43,042 --> 00:10:46,307 the mountain pass where the French lost the most men. 112 00:10:50,349 --> 00:10:53,682 At Culebra, they must dig out a man made Grand Canyon. 113 00:10:53,819 --> 00:10:55,116 A twisting, nine mile, 114 00:10:55,254 --> 00:10:59,054 water fiilled chasm as deep as a 25 story building. 115 00:11:05,531 --> 00:11:08,364 Like the French, the Americans don't know what to do 116 00:11:08,501 --> 00:11:11,959 with the staggering amount of dirt that is being dug out of Culebra. 117 00:11:12,104 --> 00:11:15,164 It is simply dumped wherever space can be found. 118 00:11:15,307 --> 00:11:20,506 Creating unstable mountains of debris that crumble in the continual rains. 119 00:11:25,718 --> 00:11:28,118 At Culebra, the Spanish word for snake, 120 00:11:28,254 --> 00:11:32,190 John Stevens, the great American engineer is stymied. 121 00:11:36,128 --> 00:11:38,528 Here, the French fiinally surrendered. 122 00:11:38,664 --> 00:11:42,293 Here, John Stevens must fiind a way through. 123 00:11:45,538 --> 00:11:48,200 Topography is only half the problem. 124 00:11:50,776 --> 00:11:51,674 In the work camps, 125 00:11:51,811 --> 00:11:55,008 where three quarters of the work force are impoverished West Indians, 126 00:11:55,147 --> 00:11:57,615 the human toll is appalling. 127 00:12:06,559 --> 00:12:08,857 Even Roosevelt's eager American volunteers, 128 00:12:08,994 --> 00:12:10,359 in their segregated barracks, 129 00:12:10,496 --> 00:12:16,560 are barely surviving on rations of crackers and sardines. 130 00:12:16,702 --> 00:12:19,466 Crammed into hovels with no toilets or running water. 131 00:12:19,605 --> 00:12:20,936 Tormented by dysentery, 132 00:12:21,073 --> 00:12:25,339 parasites and fear of yellow fever The Great Scare. 133 00:12:33,686 --> 00:12:35,449 Desperate to defeat The Great Scare 134 00:12:35,588 --> 00:12:38,079 to restore the spirits of his frightened workers 135 00:12:38,224 --> 00:12:43,184 Stevens visits Dr. William Gorgas, chief medical offiicer of the canal. 136 00:12:48,167 --> 00:12:50,795 In the yellow fever ward of the Ancon hospital, 137 00:12:50,936 --> 00:12:54,736 Dr. Gorgas introduces the victims of this horrible plague. 138 00:13:00,546 --> 00:13:04,607 Like Stevens, Gorgas has been hand picked by the President. 139 00:13:05,818 --> 00:13:08,753 At 49 years old, he is a light hearted Southerner 140 00:13:08,888 --> 00:13:11,914 plunged into a nightmare of tropical sickness. 141 00:13:15,895 --> 00:13:20,127 In Cuba, newly freed from Spanish rule by Roosevelt and his Rough Riders, 142 00:13:20,266 --> 00:13:26,068 Gorgas has succeeded in virtually eliminating yellow fever. 143 00:13:26,205 --> 00:13:30,335 Panama has proved to be a far more diffiicult assignment. 144 00:13:32,044 --> 00:13:36,174 "When the United States took possession in 1904 145 00:13:36,315 --> 00:13:42,083 the Isthmus was generally looked on as ...the most unhealthy spot in the world 146 00:13:42,221 --> 00:13:45,054 Probably it would not be extreme to say 147 00:13:45,191 --> 00:13:49,651 that there is no other place that has as bad a reputation." 148 00:13:52,665 --> 00:13:55,259 He has been in Panama for more than 13 months 149 00:13:55,401 --> 00:13:57,699 when John Stevens joins him. 150 00:13:57,837 --> 00:14:02,103 For Dr. William Crawford Gorgas, it has been a year of anguish. 151 00:14:08,814 --> 00:14:10,748 At Ancon, he relates the toll 152 00:14:10,883 --> 00:14:14,580 47 men dead of yellow fever in the past few months. 153 00:14:14,720 --> 00:14:19,054 Hundreds of other lives claimed by malaria, pneumonia, chronic dysentery, 154 00:14:19,191 --> 00:14:22,752 and, even, Bubonic plague. 155 00:14:26,999 --> 00:14:31,629 John Stevens knows that his canal cannot be built without human labor. 156 00:14:35,608 --> 00:14:37,735 Stevens has to act quickly. 157 00:14:37,877 --> 00:14:41,870 He has come to build a canal but must fiix a disaster. 158 00:14:42,014 --> 00:14:46,144 In Panama less than a week. He knows what he must do. 159 00:14:46,285 --> 00:14:49,948 It is a decision that will shock everyone. 160 00:15:00,666 --> 00:15:03,658 With undiminished energy despite the heat and rain, 161 00:15:03,802 --> 00:15:06,669 John Stevens spends seven grueling days 162 00:15:06,805 --> 00:15:11,401 inspecting every inch of the biggest excavation in human history. 163 00:15:14,179 --> 00:15:15,976 The men expect Stevens to order them 164 00:15:16,115 --> 00:15:18,845 to speed up their work on the President's Big Ditch. 165 00:15:18,984 --> 00:15:22,681 Instead, he commands them to lay down their tools. 166 00:15:25,257 --> 00:15:28,749 Hundreds of workers and technicians are shipped home to America. 167 00:15:28,894 --> 00:15:29,986 John Stevens tells them 168 00:15:30,129 --> 00:15:33,826 that the Panama Canal is unfiit for further labor. 169 00:15:36,835 --> 00:15:40,896 In Washington, the new President waits anxiously for progress reports 170 00:15:41,040 --> 00:15:43,770 from his new chief engineer. 171 00:15:43,909 --> 00:15:46,707 But the news from panama is stunning. 172 00:15:46,845 --> 00:15:49,575 The project has been shut down! 173 00:15:53,686 --> 00:15:55,483 "Regardless of the clamor of criticism... 174 00:15:55,621 --> 00:15:57,816 as long as I am in charge of the work... 175 00:15:57,957 --> 00:16:00,187 and I am confiident that if this policy is adhered to, 176 00:16:00,326 --> 00:16:02,658 the future will show its absolute wisdom." 177 00:16:07,866 --> 00:16:10,767 Stevens understands that the canal's fatal problem 178 00:16:10,903 --> 00:16:13,804 is not the mountains, but the men. 179 00:16:13,939 --> 00:16:18,638 Disease and fear sap their souls before they raise a shovel. 180 00:16:18,777 --> 00:16:21,905 Stevens turns to Dr. William Gorgas for help. 181 00:16:23,415 --> 00:16:24,643 Like the French before them, 182 00:16:24,783 --> 00:16:28,048 the Americans live in morbid terror of catching the disease 183 00:16:28,187 --> 00:16:32,715 they call Yellow Eyes, Yellow Jack or The Great Scare. 184 00:16:38,664 --> 00:16:39,995 A horrifying disease. 185 00:16:40,132 --> 00:16:43,932 Delirium and death can follow within eight hours of infection. 186 00:16:49,742 --> 00:16:53,838 Yellow fever patients fiirst complain of crippling muscle pain. 187 00:16:56,982 --> 00:17:01,043 As the aches intensify, body temperature rises steeply. 188 00:17:02,821 --> 00:17:05,551 The skin and eyes turn yellow, 189 00:17:05,691 --> 00:17:07,659 thirst becomes unquenchable 190 00:17:10,696 --> 00:17:12,960 and patients lose consciousness. 191 00:17:17,903 --> 00:17:21,634 Spasms of black vomit signal the fiinal crisis. 192 00:17:27,012 --> 00:17:30,140 Fewer than 50 percent of patients survive. 193 00:17:39,058 --> 00:17:40,958 Gorgas believes in a new theory 194 00:17:41,093 --> 00:17:46,554 that explains the cause of yellow fever mosquitoes. 195 00:17:48,267 --> 00:17:50,861 In 1901, scientists have discovered 196 00:17:51,003 --> 00:17:54,131 that the Stegomyia mosquito carries the yellow fever virus 197 00:17:54,273 --> 00:17:55,831 from person to person. 198 00:17:59,178 --> 00:18:03,740 In Panama, only Gorgas understands the mosquito's deadly secret. 199 00:18:06,885 --> 00:18:11,879 Dr. Gorgas fiinds that yellow fever mosquitoes live in towns, not jungles. 200 00:18:14,793 --> 00:18:15,657 To destroy them, 201 00:18:15,794 --> 00:18:19,890 he will need to fumigate every puddle and rain barrel on the Isthmus. 202 00:18:20,999 --> 00:18:24,935 He envisions the largest, most costly public sanitation campaign 203 00:18:25,070 --> 00:18:27,095 the world has ever seen. 204 00:18:30,909 --> 00:18:34,401 It is not a vision shared by the canal bureaucracy. 205 00:18:36,014 --> 00:18:36,946 For eighteen months, 206 00:18:37,082 --> 00:18:39,550 offiicials scoff at the mosquito theory 207 00:18:39,685 --> 00:18:44,122 and turn down all of Dr. Gorgas's requests for funds and supplies. 208 00:18:47,459 --> 00:18:49,723 But John Stevens listens. 209 00:18:50,996 --> 00:18:54,727 Only a healthy work force can rescue Teddy Roosevelt's dream. 210 00:18:57,035 --> 00:18:59,333 He will withdraw his men from the mountains, 211 00:18:59,471 --> 00:19:02,463 and send them to war against the mosquito. 212 00:19:05,544 --> 00:19:08,877 But Stevens does not ignore the other war he faces. 213 00:19:09,014 --> 00:19:12,780 The battle against Panama's impassable geography. 214 00:19:13,785 --> 00:19:16,913 Somehow, he must fiind a route beyond Culebra. 215 00:19:17,055 --> 00:19:19,421 Through the jagged jungles to the sea. 216 00:19:24,096 --> 00:19:29,159 He studies the French plans and realizes that 217 00:19:29,301 --> 00:19:31,929 the millions of tons of dirt and rock 218 00:19:32,070 --> 00:19:35,471 must be not only excavated, but removed entirely. 219 00:19:38,911 --> 00:19:41,607 Simply piling the spoil at the side of the cut 220 00:19:41,747 --> 00:19:44,978 is an invitation to landslides and disaster. 221 00:19:51,223 --> 00:19:52,247 "Effiicient transportation 222 00:19:52,391 --> 00:19:55,417 is nearly always the key to success in construction. 223 00:19:56,895 --> 00:19:58,328 If dirt is to fly, 224 00:19:58,463 --> 00:20:01,762 there must be a smooth and uninterrupted movement of trains." 225 00:20:03,936 --> 00:20:08,635 Stevens conceives a radical new plan for disposing of the dirt. 226 00:20:09,408 --> 00:20:12,639 He draws on his experience with railways in the Rockies. 227 00:20:14,846 --> 00:20:16,939 Instead of hauling men, in Panama, 228 00:20:17,082 --> 00:20:20,017 the trains will be used to cart the dirt away. 229 00:20:22,487 --> 00:20:25,012 But to do it, the entire rail system 230 00:20:25,157 --> 00:20:27,625 must be revamped to handle such a heavy load 231 00:20:27,759 --> 00:20:31,286 exactly the kind of thing Stevens does best. 232 00:20:32,898 --> 00:20:35,264 "There is no element of mystery involved. 233 00:20:35,400 --> 00:20:39,393 The most important stage in any great undertaking is the prepatory stage. 234 00:20:40,339 --> 00:20:42,830 The digging is the least thing of all." 235 00:20:45,310 --> 00:20:47,744 While Stevens attacks the Continental Divide, 236 00:20:47,879 --> 00:20:51,076 Dr. Gorgas sends out his own battalions. 237 00:20:54,152 --> 00:20:59,454 Fumigation brigades burn sulfur, clean up sewage, and seal windows. 238 00:21:00,125 --> 00:21:06,394 "It would be impossible to fumigate more extensively than we did... in 1905. 239 00:21:06,531 --> 00:21:10,228 We had about 400 men engaged in this work 240 00:21:10,369 --> 00:21:13,361 and they went over the whole town three times, 241 00:21:13,505 --> 00:21:18,408 fumigating every house in the town, besides fumigating every block 242 00:21:18,543 --> 00:21:22,673 each time a case of yellow fever occurred in that block" 243 00:21:24,182 --> 00:21:27,948 Screens are installed and water barrels are covered. 244 00:21:29,321 --> 00:21:32,381 Ditches where mosquitoes breed are drained. 245 00:21:34,293 --> 00:21:37,524 Quarantined clinics treat 900 patients a day 246 00:21:37,663 --> 00:21:40,564 and keep them in mandatory isolation. 247 00:21:43,101 --> 00:21:46,696 Stylish, sleepless and impervious to the heat, 248 00:21:46,838 --> 00:21:49,329 Gorgas works around the clock 249 00:21:49,474 --> 00:21:52,170 He stretches Roosevelt's promise of an unlimited budget 250 00:21:52,311 --> 00:21:58,250 to the breaking point, importing 120 tons of insect powder, 251 00:21:58,383 --> 00:22:01,216 America's entire output for a year. 252 00:22:01,353 --> 00:22:04,413 He orders $90,000 dollars worth of copper screening 253 00:22:04,556 --> 00:22:05,614 in a single shipment. 254 00:22:05,757 --> 00:22:08,749 Nearly double his previous yearly budget. 255 00:22:09,494 --> 00:22:11,826 It is the largest and most expensive war 256 00:22:11,963 --> 00:22:14,864 ever waged against tropical disease. 257 00:22:17,903 --> 00:22:21,202 Meanwhile, John Stevens fiights his own battle. 258 00:22:26,712 --> 00:22:29,078 He dismisses the existing rail line as 259 00:22:29,214 --> 00:22:31,978 "two streaks of rust and a right of way." 260 00:22:33,452 --> 00:22:36,285 Using his legendary status as a drawing card, 261 00:22:36,421 --> 00:22:40,619 Stevens lures the best railroad men in America to the Isthmus. 262 00:22:46,198 --> 00:22:51,659 Within six months of his arrival, he triples the work force to 24,000. 263 00:22:54,973 --> 00:22:58,704 Stevens constructs the most durable railway in history. 264 00:22:58,844 --> 00:23:01,369 Double sided tracks of the heaviest rails on earth 265 00:23:01,513 --> 00:23:05,040 allow the world's heaviest freight cars to travel in both directions, 266 00:23:05,183 --> 00:23:07,242 24 hours a day. 267 00:23:11,189 --> 00:23:16,821 Track shifting machinery moves huge sections of rail line faster and easier. 268 00:23:20,332 --> 00:23:25,326 A telegraph system, new bridges and massive locomotive sheds take shape. 269 00:23:28,306 --> 00:23:31,571 Stevens thinks big, and buys big. 270 00:23:31,710 --> 00:23:36,204 He has decided that the French suffered because their machinery was too small. 271 00:23:36,348 --> 00:23:39,408 He will not repeat their mistake. 272 00:23:41,319 --> 00:23:44,049 Every weapon in his arsenal is enormous. 273 00:23:44,189 --> 00:23:47,886 His coal burning steam shovels weigh 45 tons each. 274 00:23:48,026 --> 00:23:49,391 Mechanical dinosaurs. 275 00:23:49,528 --> 00:23:53,259 Three times larger than anything used by the Parisians. 276 00:23:58,003 --> 00:23:58,935 "Now I would liken that French plant 277 00:23:59,070 --> 00:24:03,131 to a modern one as baby carriages to automobiles. 278 00:24:03,875 --> 00:24:06,275 This is no reflection of the French, but I cannot conceive 279 00:24:06,411 --> 00:24:09,380 how they did the work they did with the plant they had." 280 00:24:12,150 --> 00:24:15,449 But Stevens has learned another lesson on the railroads. 281 00:24:15,587 --> 00:24:18,522 That morale is more valuable than machines. 282 00:24:18,657 --> 00:24:23,754 And the best way to restore morale is to keep workers clean and dry. 283 00:24:24,896 --> 00:24:27,262 There are three diseases in Panama. 284 00:24:27,399 --> 00:24:31,802 They are yellow fever, malaria, and cold feet; 285 00:24:31,937 --> 00:24:34,906 and the greatest of these is cold feet. 286 00:24:35,841 --> 00:24:38,241 The labor camps built during the French regime 287 00:24:38,376 --> 00:24:40,674 have tumbled into misery. 288 00:24:41,346 --> 00:24:44,713 Unpaved streets are ankle deep in mud. 289 00:24:45,217 --> 00:24:49,381 Waste is emptied onto passerby from second story windows. 290 00:24:54,059 --> 00:24:57,495 Stevens wades in like a Wild West sheriff. 291 00:24:57,629 --> 00:25:01,224 Closing brothels, demolishing decrepit barracks, 292 00:25:02,100 --> 00:25:06,469 building a new city of paved streets and sanitary dwellings. 293 00:25:16,147 --> 00:25:19,207 The Canal line begins to look like a continuous city 294 00:25:19,351 --> 00:25:22,878 under construction from one end of the zone to the other. 295 00:25:26,424 --> 00:25:30,019 As 1906 begins, fiive months after being in Panama, 296 00:25:30,161 --> 00:25:32,789 he feels he has made Panama livable. 297 00:25:32,931 --> 00:25:36,230 He is ready to begin digging at Culebra again. 298 00:25:41,339 --> 00:25:42,306 A few months later, 299 00:25:42,440 --> 00:25:46,604 Dr. William Gorgas declares victory over The Great Scare. 300 00:25:55,654 --> 00:25:58,054 "Take a good look at this man, boys. 301 00:25:58,189 --> 00:26:01,920 For it's the last case of yellow fever you will ever see. 302 00:26:02,060 --> 00:26:06,656 There will never be any more deaths from this cause in Panama." 303 00:26:10,168 --> 00:26:13,626 Panama is busy again healthy and fearless. 304 00:26:13,772 --> 00:26:16,468 Along the entire length of the Canal corridor, 305 00:26:16,608 --> 00:26:20,977 the racket of hammers and saws and the roar of engines can be heard. 306 00:26:23,448 --> 00:26:26,349 President Roosevelt's dream of splitting a continent 307 00:26:26,484 --> 00:26:28,679 is being brought to life again. 308 00:26:53,411 --> 00:26:56,278 As a new railway is pushed through the jungles of Panama, 309 00:26:56,414 --> 00:26:58,882 John Stevens rarely rests. 310 00:26:59,017 --> 00:27:03,750 It is the summer of 1906, Stevens drives himself to exhaustion 311 00:27:03,888 --> 00:27:06,288 and expects his men to do the same. 312 00:27:09,260 --> 00:27:11,694 "I gauge everybody by myself. 313 00:27:11,830 --> 00:27:14,594 I work from 14 to 18 hours. 314 00:27:14,733 --> 00:27:15,961 You may make mistakes 315 00:27:16,101 --> 00:27:19,764 but there is only one mistake you can make that will be fatal with me, 316 00:27:19,904 --> 00:27:22,304 and that is to do nothing." 317 00:27:25,043 --> 00:27:28,706 Stevens believes his workers are safe from the Great Scare. 318 00:27:28,847 --> 00:27:32,647 But yellow fever has been relatively easy to eradicate. 319 00:27:33,485 --> 00:27:39,754 Now a far more formidable enemy must be confronted malaria. 320 00:27:46,731 --> 00:27:49,097 "If we can control malaria, 321 00:27:49,234 --> 00:27:52,863 I feel very little anxiety about other diseases. 322 00:27:53,004 --> 00:27:58,840 If we do not control malaria our mortality is going to be heavy." 323 00:28:02,380 --> 00:28:05,110 The Anopheles mosquito that transmits malaria 324 00:28:05,250 --> 00:28:08,242 is not the same insect that carries yellow fever. 325 00:28:10,622 --> 00:28:16,583 It is an entirely different species and far more diffiicult to control. 326 00:28:18,897 --> 00:28:21,923 She lives longer, flies further, 327 00:28:22,067 --> 00:28:26,367 and thrives in the stagnant waters of the Panamanian forests. 328 00:28:28,673 --> 00:28:32,575 Right where John Stevens's new railway is being built. 329 00:28:36,715 --> 00:28:38,910 The latest arrivals from North America 330 00:28:39,050 --> 00:28:42,508 and the West Indies are in gravest danger from being bitten. 331 00:28:43,988 --> 00:28:46,013 Most Panamanians, as Gorgas knows, 332 00:28:46,157 --> 00:28:49,490 develop a natural immunity to malaria in childhood. 333 00:28:50,562 --> 00:28:55,590 But nearly every new comer including Dr. Gorgas and his entire medical staff 334 00:28:55,734 --> 00:29:00,262 become infected within months enduring recurring episodes of 335 00:29:00,405 --> 00:29:04,535 fever, chills, depression, and intense pain. 336 00:29:06,244 --> 00:29:08,610 Gorgas warns Stevens that the new settlements 337 00:29:08,747 --> 00:29:10,476 he is building along his railway 338 00:29:10,615 --> 00:29:13,812 are placing thousands of American workers at risk 339 00:29:16,221 --> 00:29:20,248 "I suppose it is no exaggeration to say that any man 340 00:29:20,391 --> 00:29:25,522 who spends a night in one of these villages will contract malaria." 341 00:29:31,202 --> 00:29:34,296 John Stevens knows the danger of malaria. 342 00:29:35,473 --> 00:29:39,534 But also knows that work must continue if the canal is to be built. 343 00:29:54,759 --> 00:29:58,627 All along the line, the pace of construction intensifiies. 344 00:30:00,598 --> 00:30:05,501 Laborers from North America, Europe, the Orient and the West Indies arrive. 345 00:30:08,473 --> 00:30:12,739 Many bring their families, building a new life in a new country. 346 00:30:14,846 --> 00:30:17,644 Feeding the masses is an enormous job. 347 00:30:17,782 --> 00:30:21,775 Bakeries turn out 40,000 loaves of bread a day. 348 00:30:23,655 --> 00:30:25,213 Stevens builds laundries, 349 00:30:25,356 --> 00:30:28,416 and recreation halls for the men and their families. 350 00:30:31,930 --> 00:30:35,297 An amazing ice house brings the loudest cheers. 351 00:30:35,433 --> 00:30:39,870 The very idea of ice cream in the jungle delights the crews. 352 00:30:41,539 --> 00:30:43,200 Music fiills the air. 353 00:30:43,341 --> 00:30:46,708 They begin to call Culebra "Stevens City." 354 00:30:52,383 --> 00:30:56,410 But the deadly plague of malaria is never far away. 355 00:30:58,489 --> 00:31:02,391 Dr. Gorgas and his fumigation brigades keep ahead of the track gangs. 356 00:31:02,527 --> 00:31:04,119 Cleansing the new villages. 357 00:31:04,262 --> 00:31:06,662 Pushing deep into the wilderness. 358 00:31:16,474 --> 00:31:19,671 They drain swamps and spray oil on cesspools 359 00:31:19,811 --> 00:31:22,279 to prevent eggs from hatching. 360 00:31:31,623 --> 00:31:35,753 Stagnant water is routinely tested for the presence of larvae. 361 00:31:42,300 --> 00:31:45,963 A modern running water system as good as in an American city 362 00:31:46,104 --> 00:31:49,505 is installed and acres of brush are burned. 363 00:31:55,480 --> 00:31:59,177 Daily doses of quinine made from the bark of a tropical tree 364 00:31:59,317 --> 00:32:01,512 are part of each man's diet. 365 00:32:02,453 --> 00:32:06,150 They call the bitter tasting drink a "Panama cocktail." 366 00:32:10,361 --> 00:32:15,230 As Dr. Gorgas battles the mosquito, John Stevens battles the mountain. 367 00:32:20,071 --> 00:32:24,531 This is the ultimate roadblock the Continental Divide. 368 00:32:28,479 --> 00:32:32,245 Stevens calculates that he must dig a channel nine miles long 369 00:32:32,383 --> 00:32:36,979 and 272 feet deep through solid volcanic rock 370 00:32:41,392 --> 00:32:44,623 It will require that man and machines move enough dirt 371 00:32:44,762 --> 00:32:49,324 to build the Great Pyramids of Cheops 63 times. 372 00:32:50,935 --> 00:32:52,835 John Stevens has been given command 373 00:32:52,971 --> 00:32:58,034 of the grandest construction project in four thousand years. 374 00:33:04,215 --> 00:33:07,742 "Even with the fiinances of the most powerful nation on earth, 375 00:33:07,885 --> 00:33:10,752 we are contending with Nature's forces. 376 00:33:12,023 --> 00:33:13,888 When we speak of a hundred million yards 377 00:33:14,025 --> 00:33:17,256 of a single cut not to exceed nine miles in length, 378 00:33:17,395 --> 00:33:19,488 we are facing a proposition greater than 379 00:33:19,630 --> 00:33:23,464 was ever undertaken in the engineering history of the world." 380 00:33:26,738 --> 00:33:30,196 Making a sea level canal from the Atlantic to the Pacifiic 381 00:33:30,341 --> 00:33:32,935 means cutting deep into the mountain range. 382 00:33:33,077 --> 00:33:37,207 The French spent nine years trying, and failed. 383 00:33:41,052 --> 00:33:45,250 Now Stevens wonders how he will conquer Culebra. 384 00:33:47,058 --> 00:33:49,026 The problem is water. 385 00:33:52,196 --> 00:33:55,324 The tropical rainy season arrives in April. 386 00:33:55,933 --> 00:33:57,924 Massive flooding, daily down pours 387 00:33:58,069 --> 00:34:01,505 and the constant risk of deadly landslides. 388 00:34:04,976 --> 00:34:09,345 Stevens has never faced anything like this in the Rocky Mountains. 389 00:34:11,049 --> 00:34:15,679 He realizes that to build a sea level canal here will be a deadly undertaking 390 00:34:15,820 --> 00:34:18,983 that could take twice as long as anticipated. 391 00:34:21,025 --> 00:34:22,788 And there is another enemy. 392 00:34:22,927 --> 00:34:26,829 When the rain comes, the placid Chagres River swells with anger, 393 00:34:26,964 --> 00:34:29,933 rising 20 feet in just one day. 394 00:34:32,503 --> 00:34:37,270 The floods will inundate any canal Stevens tries to dig through it. 395 00:34:39,844 --> 00:34:43,780 Even if he moves the mountains, he cannot stop the rains. 396 00:34:48,119 --> 00:34:50,485 "The one great problem in the construction of the canal 397 00:34:50,621 --> 00:34:52,953 is the control of the Chagres River. 398 00:34:53,091 --> 00:34:55,958 That overshadows everything else." 399 00:34:56,928 --> 00:35:01,297 Stevens now realizes that a sea level canal is not possible. 400 00:35:01,432 --> 00:35:04,060 The mountain is too big. 401 00:35:06,704 --> 00:35:08,672 To dig it all the way down to sea level 402 00:35:08,806 --> 00:35:13,971 and transport it away is beyond their current technological capabilities. 403 00:35:16,681 --> 00:35:19,343 There is, however, another way, 404 00:35:19,484 --> 00:35:23,318 one that will use the geography of Panama rather than conquer it. 405 00:35:23,454 --> 00:35:27,049 It is a plan that will change the course of history. 406 00:35:27,191 --> 00:35:30,592 But fiirst he needs to convince the President. 407 00:35:38,302 --> 00:35:42,329 To sell his revolutionary new plan to the President of the United States, 408 00:35:42,473 --> 00:35:45,465 John Stevens must sail to Washington. 409 00:35:49,280 --> 00:35:51,248 For a man who is chronically sea sick 410 00:35:51,382 --> 00:35:54,874 the voyage is as forbidding as the destination. 411 00:35:58,589 --> 00:36:03,322 At the White House, Stevens unveils his amazing new blueprint. 412 00:36:07,231 --> 00:36:10,257 He intends to lift the world's largest ships 413 00:36:10,401 --> 00:36:12,494 up one side of the Continental Divide, 414 00:36:12,637 --> 00:36:14,537 then down the other. 415 00:36:15,673 --> 00:36:19,769 He will dam the Chagres River to create a huge artifiicial lake. 416 00:36:19,911 --> 00:36:24,905 And build a series of mammoth locks to conquer the steep spine of Panama. 417 00:36:32,156 --> 00:36:35,387 In essence, the mountain won't be cut down to sea level. 418 00:36:35,526 --> 00:36:38,017 The ships will be floated up to the mountain 419 00:36:38,162 --> 00:36:40,960 and sailed across a bridge of water. 420 00:36:43,367 --> 00:36:45,767 It is an audacious plan. 421 00:36:46,904 --> 00:36:49,236 A clear statement that Stevens believes that 422 00:36:49,373 --> 00:36:51,000 the French struggled for nine years 423 00:36:51,142 --> 00:36:55,841 and lost the lives of 16,000 men to a doomed dream. 424 00:37:00,051 --> 00:37:04,545 But in 1906 no one knows if Stevens's plan will work either. 425 00:37:09,860 --> 00:37:14,058 Theodore Roosevelt has promised Stevens his unconditional support. 426 00:37:14,198 --> 00:37:15,790 Now he proves it. 427 00:37:17,702 --> 00:37:21,900 In February of 1906, Roosevelt signs a Presidential sanction 428 00:37:22,039 --> 00:37:26,669 authorizing the construction of Stevens' new high lake lock plan. 429 00:37:30,181 --> 00:37:32,775 Fifteen months after taking charge of Panama, 430 00:37:32,917 --> 00:37:37,115 Stevens is fiinally ready to build the President his dream. 431 00:37:39,357 --> 00:37:41,257 Roosevelt must convince Americans 432 00:37:41,392 --> 00:37:46,022 that John Stevens and William Gorgas can conquer nature and geography. 433 00:37:46,163 --> 00:37:49,155 Convince skeptics that a canal can be built. 434 00:37:49,300 --> 00:37:50,494 To prove his faith, 435 00:37:50,635 --> 00:37:55,299 the President decides to stage one of the 20th century's fiirst media events. 436 00:37:55,439 --> 00:38:00,069 He and the First Lady will visit the Big Ditch themselves. 437 00:38:02,446 --> 00:38:05,381 It is a decision that captivates the nation. 438 00:38:05,516 --> 00:38:10,579 No American president has ever visited foreign soil while in offiice. 439 00:38:18,462 --> 00:38:21,454 To grasp fiirst hand the diffiiculties of the project, 440 00:38:21,599 --> 00:38:25,660 Roosevelt insists on being in Panama during the rainy season. 441 00:38:28,005 --> 00:38:32,874 On the second day of his visit, three inches of rain fall in two hours. 442 00:38:33,577 --> 00:38:36,171 One inch falling in 15 minutes. 443 00:38:37,481 --> 00:38:41,577 It is the worst downpour in Panama in fiifteen years. 444 00:38:43,854 --> 00:38:45,822 With photographers never far away, 445 00:38:45,956 --> 00:38:48,823 the young President strolls through construction camps, 446 00:38:48,959 --> 00:38:53,259 dines in a mess hall with the men and shares meals with John Stevens. 447 00:38:53,397 --> 00:38:54,921 He visits the Culebra Cut, 448 00:38:55,066 --> 00:38:57,660 and delivers stirring prep talks in the jungle, 449 00:38:57,802 --> 00:38:59,360 telling workers that they are soldiers 450 00:38:59,503 --> 00:39:03,132 fiighting a glorious war for America's destiny. 451 00:39:03,274 --> 00:39:05,674 The laborers are impressed and honored. 452 00:39:05,810 --> 00:39:09,837 Their applause rivals the thunder in the tropical skies. 453 00:39:10,481 --> 00:39:12,711 "You, here, who do your work well 454 00:39:12,850 --> 00:39:16,547 in bringing to completion this great enterprise, 455 00:39:16,687 --> 00:39:20,680 will stand exactly as the soldiers of a few, and only a few, 456 00:39:20,825 --> 00:39:25,626 of the most famous armies of all the nations stand in history." 457 00:39:29,100 --> 00:39:31,568 With his signature showmanship, the President, 458 00:39:31,702 --> 00:39:34,068 in his famous white suit and Panama hat, 459 00:39:34,205 --> 00:39:38,665 leaps aboard one of the mighty 95 ton Bucyrus shovels. 460 00:39:39,677 --> 00:39:43,704 The men cheer this icon of American know how, a reminder that, 461 00:39:43,848 --> 00:39:47,784 for Americans, there is no obstacle too formidable. 462 00:39:50,388 --> 00:39:54,324 But another war is being won, far from the spotlight. 463 00:39:55,426 --> 00:39:58,395 On the second day of his tour, Roosevelt quietly slips 464 00:39:58,529 --> 00:40:00,656 away from the cameras and the secret service 465 00:40:00,798 --> 00:40:03,926 to pay Dr. Gorgas an unannounced visit. 466 00:40:05,136 --> 00:40:08,230 The two men walk through an almost deserted ward. 467 00:40:08,372 --> 00:40:10,499 It is a quiet moment of proud victory. 468 00:40:10,641 --> 00:40:12,973 Stunning evidence that the Alabama doctor 469 00:40:13,110 --> 00:40:16,375 has brought health and sanitation to deadly Panama. 470 00:40:16,514 --> 00:40:19,005 The Great Scare is over. 471 00:40:21,852 --> 00:40:24,320 Roosevelt reciprocates with the public praise Gorgas 472 00:40:24,455 --> 00:40:27,515 has hungered for since he fiirst arrived in Panama. 473 00:40:27,658 --> 00:40:30,024 When Roosevelt praises the miracle in Panama 474 00:40:30,161 --> 00:40:32,561 and cites Stevens and Gorgas by name, 475 00:40:32,696 --> 00:40:35,358 they become celebrities across America. 476 00:40:35,933 --> 00:40:37,127 "They are doing something 477 00:40:37,268 --> 00:40:41,170 which will redound immeasurable to the credit of America, 478 00:40:41,305 --> 00:40:46,174 which will benefiit all the world, and which will last for ages to come. 479 00:40:46,310 --> 00:40:49,768 Under Mr. Stevens and Dr. Gorgas this work 480 00:40:49,914 --> 00:40:53,441 has started with every omen of good fortune." 481 00:40:57,655 --> 00:40:59,748 While the President boasts and bellows, 482 00:40:59,890 --> 00:41:02,586 the mountains of Panama remain unconquered. 483 00:41:02,726 --> 00:41:08,323 Stevens has devised an ambitious plan, but it remains no more than a blueprint. 484 00:41:12,136 --> 00:41:13,569 To make the plan a reality, 485 00:41:13,704 --> 00:41:16,832 Stevens will begin with the damming of the Chagres River, 486 00:41:16,974 --> 00:41:20,341 creating the largest man made lake in the world. 487 00:41:22,179 --> 00:41:24,670 Dozens of villages must be evacuated, 488 00:41:24,815 --> 00:41:27,807 their residents relocated to higher ground. 489 00:41:28,686 --> 00:41:32,520 A new city, called Gatun, must be built from scratch. 490 00:41:35,526 --> 00:41:38,984 Surveying parties outline the contours of a body of water 491 00:41:39,129 --> 00:41:42,621 that will cover 164 square miles. 492 00:41:49,573 --> 00:41:53,065 The entire region must be clear cut by hand. 493 00:41:53,210 --> 00:41:56,976 This job alone will take almost fiive years to complete. 494 00:42:00,251 --> 00:42:04,381 And with this new plan will come massive concrete and electrical work 495 00:42:04,522 --> 00:42:07,320 unlike anything the world has ever seen. 496 00:42:07,691 --> 00:42:11,559 Things that John Stevens has little experience working with. 497 00:42:16,467 --> 00:42:20,961 Such a massive construction project will also invite bureaucratic red tape, 498 00:42:21,105 --> 00:42:23,972 and increased political interference from Washingt 499 00:42:24,108 --> 00:42:28,511 The very things that John Stevens has fought against all his life. 500 00:42:36,487 --> 00:42:41,083 Meanwhile dynamite crews risk their lives and begin blasting into Culebra 501 00:42:41,225 --> 00:42:44,490 to loosen the mountain from its ancient domain. 502 00:42:51,869 --> 00:42:54,064 Stevens continues his daily routine 503 00:42:54,204 --> 00:42:57,469 of surveying the work in Culebra for himself. 504 00:43:07,017 --> 00:43:10,919 96 million cubic yards of dirt will be moved by train, 505 00:43:11,055 --> 00:43:13,421 along hundreds of miles of new track 506 00:43:13,557 --> 00:43:18,585 Enough dirt to fiill enough hopper cars to circle the globe four times. 507 00:43:22,266 --> 00:43:25,429 The work force healthy and excavation well under way, 508 00:43:25,569 --> 00:43:28,732 Gorgas and Stevens have fiinally set in motion a plan 509 00:43:28,872 --> 00:43:30,965 to bring down the mountain. 510 00:43:31,108 --> 00:43:33,440 It is a plan that will prove Stevens right 511 00:43:33,577 --> 00:43:36,410 and fiinally get the Canal built. 512 00:43:37,348 --> 00:43:39,680 But there is one more surprise. 513 00:43:39,817 --> 00:43:42,945 One of these men will walk away. 514 00:43:49,460 --> 00:43:50,620 Less than three months 515 00:43:50,761 --> 00:43:53,924 after President Roosevelt's confiidence boosting visit, 516 00:43:54,064 --> 00:43:58,398 John Stevens quits the project and leaves Panama. 517 00:43:59,436 --> 00:44:01,836 It is a mysterious gesture. 518 00:44:01,972 --> 00:44:05,965 He offers no reason to his workers, to Dr. Gorgas, or his own family. 519 00:44:06,110 --> 00:44:08,203 Not even the President. 520 00:44:11,882 --> 00:44:14,578 Theodore Roosevelt is deeply angered. 521 00:44:14,718 --> 00:44:17,949 Publicly, he conceals his anger, telling friends that Stevens 522 00:44:18,088 --> 00:44:21,489 is unable to withstand the punishing Panamanian climate 523 00:44:21,625 --> 00:44:23,923 that he has become ill and sleepless. 524 00:44:24,061 --> 00:44:27,155 But privately the president feels betrayed. 525 00:44:29,867 --> 00:44:32,461 Others believe that the solitary mountain man 526 00:44:32,603 --> 00:44:36,004 could not endure the massive bureaucracy of the canal commission 527 00:44:36,140 --> 00:44:39,473 or the contract system that was forced upon him. 528 00:44:42,079 --> 00:44:45,310 It is a secret he takes to his grave. 529 00:44:47,418 --> 00:44:50,387 "The reasons for the resignation were purely personal. 530 00:44:50,521 --> 00:44:51,954 I have never declared these reasons 531 00:44:52,089 --> 00:44:54,853 and probably never will, as they are private." 532 00:44:58,328 --> 00:44:59,590 Nearly a century later, 533 00:44:59,730 --> 00:45:02,927 no one knows why the greatest civil engineer of his era 534 00:45:03,067 --> 00:45:06,093 abandoned the most important project of his lifetime. 535 00:45:06,236 --> 00:45:08,295 Suddenly and without warning. 536 00:45:10,174 --> 00:45:14,076 Perhaps he sensed that the hardest work was already behind him. 537 00:45:14,578 --> 00:45:16,842 That history had anointed him to plan the canal, 538 00:45:16,980 --> 00:45:19,608 then move on while others built it. 539 00:45:25,456 --> 00:45:27,754 In eighteen months, John Stevens succeeded 540 00:45:27,891 --> 00:45:31,122 where others had labored in vain for generations. 541 00:45:33,063 --> 00:45:36,396 He provided decent housing and food for his loyal workers. 542 00:45:36,533 --> 00:45:38,501 And pushed through a jungle railroad network 543 00:45:38,635 --> 00:45:41,195 to move huge quantities of earth. 544 00:45:44,041 --> 00:45:45,736 Perhaps most important of all, 545 00:45:45,876 --> 00:45:49,937 he cast the weight of his prestige behind Dr. Gorgas. 546 00:45:50,080 --> 00:45:52,708 Understanding that fear, not mountains, 547 00:45:52,850 --> 00:45:55,546 blocked the path between the seas. 548 00:46:07,898 --> 00:46:11,834 In 1914, seven years after Stevens's departure, 549 00:46:11,969 --> 00:46:15,461 Dr. Gorgas silently paddles a small wooden canoe 550 00:46:15,606 --> 00:46:17,972 through the freshly cut canal. 551 00:46:21,178 --> 00:46:25,114 He is the fiirst to travel voyage through the Canal. 552 00:46:25,249 --> 00:46:29,709 The offiicial opening of the canal won't happen for three more months. 553 00:46:34,057 --> 00:46:37,458 All around him is evidence of John Stevens' vision. 554 00:46:37,594 --> 00:46:41,496 A magnifiicent bridge of water that lifts ships out of the ocean 555 00:46:41,632 --> 00:46:45,295 and sails them smoothly across the Isthmus of Panama. 556 00:46:49,606 --> 00:46:52,700 After 30 years and the loss of thousands of lives, 557 00:46:52,843 --> 00:46:55,573 the dream of Columbus, has been achieved. 558 00:46:55,712 --> 00:46:57,509 The union of the oceans. 559 00:46:57,648 --> 00:47:00,139 And the shrinking of the world. 560 00:47:05,589 --> 00:47:08,717 It has taken seven years to complete the Canal. 561 00:47:08,859 --> 00:47:12,295 The President asks the Army to fimish the job. 562 00:47:14,698 --> 00:47:16,495 And though it would be wider and deeper, 563 00:47:16,633 --> 00:47:19,431 it would resemble almost perfectly the lock system 564 00:47:19,570 --> 00:47:21,162 that John Stevens had convinced 565 00:47:21,305 --> 00:47:25,036 Teddy Roosevelt to build across the Isthmus. 566 00:47:26,743 --> 00:47:29,439 And it is a spectacular vision. 567 00:47:31,949 --> 00:47:34,918 The locks at both ends are the largest in the world. 568 00:47:35,052 --> 00:47:38,078 Over 80 feet high, they are fiive blocks long 569 00:47:38,222 --> 00:47:41,316 and stand as tall as a six story building. 570 00:47:46,697 --> 00:47:49,359 Monstrous T shaped cantilever cranes 571 00:47:49,499 --> 00:47:53,936 that can be seen from miles away float plates of steel through the air. 572 00:47:59,643 --> 00:48:02,134 More concrete four and a half million barrels 573 00:48:02,279 --> 00:48:06,215 than has ever been used in history is poured into the locks. 574 00:48:10,354 --> 00:48:14,154 Six million rivets are needed to build the lock gates. 575 00:48:24,134 --> 00:48:27,001 Gatun Lake, at 164 square miles, 576 00:48:27,137 --> 00:48:30,629 would be the largest man made lake in the world. 577 00:48:32,109 --> 00:48:35,636 And Gatun dam, made from the spoil of the Culebra Cut, 578 00:48:35,779 --> 00:48:38,373 is the largest in the world to be made of earth. 579 00:48:38,515 --> 00:48:43,111 It is a mile and a half long and half a mile wide at its base. 580 00:48:49,760 --> 00:48:53,127 The Canal is the work of more than 100,000 laborers 581 00:48:53,263 --> 00:48:55,788 from 97 different countries. 582 00:48:59,403 --> 00:49:02,099 Most would not live to sail through it. 583 00:49:05,175 --> 00:49:06,164 The fiinal bill. 584 00:49:06,310 --> 00:49:08,437 Over $600 million dollars. 585 00:49:08,578 --> 00:49:12,639 In an age when a worker was fortunate to earn a dollar a day. 586 00:49:18,989 --> 00:49:23,392 The single greatest engineering undertaking in American history. 587 00:49:29,766 --> 00:49:32,234 Teddy Roosevelt never returns to the Big Ditch 588 00:49:32,369 --> 00:49:34,599 to see his dream brought to life. 589 00:49:34,738 --> 00:49:38,606 He leaves offiice in 1909 and dies in 1919, 590 00:49:38,742 --> 00:49:41,142 seven months before America's Pacifiic Fleet 591 00:49:41,278 --> 00:49:43,940 fiirst passes through the Canal. 592 00:49:53,590 --> 00:49:57,754 John Stevens fiinds another mountain and another railway. 593 00:49:57,894 --> 00:50:02,228 In 1917 he is sent to Russia by President Woodrow Wilson 594 00:50:02,366 --> 00:50:05,631 to reorganize the Trans Siberian Railway. 595 00:50:06,670 --> 00:50:09,264 Not until 1937, at age 83, 596 00:50:09,406 --> 00:50:14,002 does he return to Panama to gaze upon his masterpiece. 597 00:50:14,945 --> 00:50:19,075 He dies in North Carolina six years later at age 90. 598 00:50:24,254 --> 00:50:26,279 Only Dr. William Crawford Gorgas 599 00:50:26,423 --> 00:50:30,223 sees America's work in Panama through from start to end. 600 00:50:33,530 --> 00:50:35,964 By the time he returns to the United States, 601 00:50:36,099 --> 00:50:37,862 he has completely eradicated Yellow Fever 602 00:50:38,001 --> 00:50:42,165 from the Canal Zone and reduced malarial infection 603 00:50:42,305 --> 00:50:45,934 to rates lower than most American cities at the time. 604 00:50:48,211 --> 00:50:52,341 The physician's work in Panama brings him great public acclaim. 605 00:50:54,851 --> 00:50:56,648 He is appointed Surgeon General, 606 00:50:56,787 --> 00:51:00,450 a supreme honor for a country doctor from Alabama. 607 00:51:03,293 --> 00:51:05,659 He leads the American Medical Services Corps to Europe 608 00:51:05,796 --> 00:51:08,697 during the First World War. 609 00:51:09,199 --> 00:51:13,693 In 1920 he dies a hero and is given a state funeral. 610 00:51:27,350 --> 00:51:29,409 One man battled mountains. 611 00:51:29,553 --> 00:51:32,681 The other, the tiny bearers of death. 612 00:51:35,425 --> 00:51:36,858 This is their monument. 613 00:51:36,993 --> 00:51:39,120 The bridging of a continent. 614 00:51:39,262 --> 00:51:42,595 The union of the seas.