Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1914-05-27
WHAT THE BIG CANAL
NOW LOOKS LIKE
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continued from First Page.1
bottom. The depth of the canal
throughout is forty five feet except al
the Atlantic entrance where the
bottom will lie forty-one1 feet at
mean tide.
The great problem Of the canal as
| have pointed out previously was
first to make it possible for men to
live in the zone. This being settled
the next problem was the impounding
of the waters of the Chagres river and
the construction of the locks and
spillway. The engineering Difficult
ties here overcome have aroused the
admiration of the whole world, both
for the speed of accomplishment and
the stability of the completed work.
A STORY HARD TO TELL IN FIGURES
There is little in figures; one can
not grasp the immensely of the under
taking until one stands in the shadow
of this giant enterprise. For in
stance | am told that the actual
amount of cement poured in the con-
struction of these locks is placed at
two and quarter million cubic yards.
This seems like a lot of cement but
to me it really means nothing. But
when | stood in contemplation before
these giant stairways and realized
that there were twelve of them, all
in duplicate and that any one of them
would stand up even with six story
building, | could understand some
thing of their magnitude. And then
when | realized that ninety-two
leaves were used to operate these
several locks and that the electrically
controlled devices for operating them
were controlled by a mechanism that
worked as smooth as clock work,
there came home to me that down
here under the vertical rays of the
trOpic sun our American brethren had
been really doing something. And
when one considers the effect all this
will have on the future history of the
world we are prone to swell up a
trifie over the fact that we are alive
in an age when big things are the
regular order.
THE CANAL ZONE.
Just briefly let us look over this
new American possession which is so
small in area and so big in con-
sequences. The Canal Zone contains
about 1886 square miles. 1t begins
at point three marine miles from
mean low water mark in each ocean
and extends for five miles on each
side of the center route Of the canal.
1t includes the group of islands in the
bay of Panama named Perico, Naos,
Culebra and Flamenco. The cities
OF Panama and Colon are excluded
from the Zone territory, but the
United States has the right to en-
force sanitary ordinances in these
cities. Of the 436 square miles the
United States owns about SO and 70
are held in private ownership. Under
the treaty with Panama the United
States has the right to acquire by
purchase or by the exercise of the
right Of eminent domain, any lands
or properties necessary for the pro-
lection or maintenance of the canal
and can therefore acquire the remain
ing land at any time. The population
of the Canal Zone outside of Colon
and Panama is $4,000.
This is the strip of land lying
down near the waistline of the uni
verse on which the eyes of a whole
world are resting at this time; and
this is the property which means so
much towards the development of
trade with our sister republics in
South America and so much for our
own military protection.
What it will mean in a commercial
way is the big factor, for while we
may get into war and need the
canal at some time, we will surely
get busy with commerce at once and
will need the canal all the time.
What it will mean in a commercial
way is the item fraught with big in
terest and | shall look into that
matter in my next letter.
OFT n EooNT LITIJV