The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-02-03

During his present visit to the Islh- linus, President4elect Taft will note many
 evidences of the .wonderfrt progress ltoward the ultimate cpmpletion of the canal. In the nine months that have passed since he last called on the car l nal diHgers they have excavated 21s- 00O.0o0 cubic yarsde of material Un- less there is an unexpected ntshap Tn
 the present month. 1t will foot up the yards in the ten mouths, The bigness of this excavation does not appear un-i til;it is reduced to every.day terms. The average city house is probably, twepty-one feet vide, thirty three feet l high and forty-eight feet deep, The reservations at Panama in ten months l would make hole in the earth biG enough ito bury 2S,00o such houses. l TO iiinatrhte In another way the l tmmensity of ten naonths work: IT 1 the excavations we're uniform across l tha isthrnus for the entire fifty miles lfron deep walter in the Atlantic to deep water in the Pacific, the result would feet wide thfoushO6t the whole dis tance. If it were possible to main: ftsTin &ht8 %Fenfena6uk pace until the end it would be only about twenty six e1n0ntlfs rom the first of March un. til the last shoveiful of dart was turned
 or course no one expectSftnet sucn q remarkable pace can be kept up % the end. 1t is the wonder of the entire engineering world that shsy have been ahle tn maintain 1t uR to the present. l time, No such sustained efort has | evar been put forth in n..the entire hss- tory of the world. Yet 1t has been done under surroundings or unusual I difficulty---duriing the ten months per haps an average of three feet or water has fallen at every point on the lstn- mus. at times coming in downpours or d haif foot a day. Whatever else MT. Taft may see. he will at least not fah to see the biggest hole that was ever dug in ten months. During the tWeIve months of the calendar year just past the 9excavations amounted to more than se.0O0.0OO cubic yards If they can keep the same pace tnrough tne present year, there win De only ae.- I 6O0 coo cubic yards of material lsft 70 be excavated when New Years Day next rolls around. the Isthmus turning their attention liargely to the Gatun Dam. They con laIder that they have the excavation | problem solved, and that the construc- tion of the loeks and dams is the only lproblem that demands serious ccn- alteration. As to the locks ana oans | at the Pacific side they offer no sert- ous difficulties. Vast as are their pros l portions, they look like child's play be-
 side the Gatun Dam and focks.' While there Is but little more than 6e,000'e00, cubic yards of material yet 70 pc taken out of the canal there are ss'- 100000 cubic yards of dirt to Do pumped l up into the Gatun Dam Add to this
 the tremendous amount of water nat must be pumped tip to hold this dirt In suspension until it Is deposited on the dam. and then the imnlensity of
 the work of building Gatun Dam Will
 appear. The dam will contain some l 2i,00O, 900 cubic yards of dirt.
 Ia whole army of suction dreoges
 will be assigned to the work of pump ing up the material. These will have twenty-inch centrifugal pumps and
 hour after hour. day after day. and
 month after month, working Tn day
 and night shifts, they will press for
 ward the work of rearing. this artin-
 cial mountain across a river valley:
 Perhaps 60 per cent Of the material
 they pump up will be water. Of the
 remaining 40 per cent Engineer Sa-
 yille figures that only so per cent will
 remain on the dam. On this basis
 nearly as much material will have 70
 pass through those pumps as has been
 taken from the canal proper from the
 day the French turned the first shovel
 ful of dirt down to the present tirne.
 When MT, Taft was last on the lsth-
 mus all the plans for Gattn Dam were tentative. The experiments have now
 been made. and the work Is ready 10
 proceed.
 The amount of supplies that has been
 used on the 1sthmus in the past ten
 months is byeond the conception or
 most men, Think of the damage car load of dynamite has often wrongnt'
 how 1t has sometiHfes almost annthilat-
 cd small towns. Then fancy zoo car
 loads of it being used in one bFief ten month period. That is the way they . have been using 1t down on the Asth-
 mus since Mir. Taft was last there
 They have used a half million blasting
 eaps and everything else In proportion.
 when he last looked over the bie
 dituh. MT. Taft was wonderfully hn.
 pressed with the sanitary situation In fine Canal Zone. It was regarded as
 the climax of all the arguments in fa-
 vor of the merits of preventive niedt-
 cine. The record of each year suR-
 passea the previous one. Last year the
 death rate among the negroes in the
 canal employ was nearly forty-six oul A of every thousand member of the force s This year 1t was less than twenty out
 of every thousand. Jamaica, from h which island comes large percent @ nal, is one of the most hea1thful isl n ands within the tropics yet the death 5 rate there is fully third Haore than 2 the death rate among the negroes on the Isthmus. The death rate among T the negroes in the canal employ ia labout one-half less than among those