Final part 1 b

Final Part 1 B

By Lauren Byrum

The Panama Canal

• Was created to be a short cut to the Pacific Ocean• The same man who oversaw the creation of the Suez

Canal was the overseer for the Panama Canal and thought he could do it the same way

• The project was first undertaken by the French but was never completed due to disease, death, and economic hardships.

• 3 out 4 people that were admitted to the hospital during the French portion of this project died

• Because of the fail by the French people it was thought to be impossible and the project was left untouched for a while.

Involvement of Teddy Roosevelt in the Completion of the Panama Canal

• With the death of William McKinley, Theodore became president

• Roosevelt lobbied for Congress’ permission to take on the project of creating the Panama Canal and it was granted to him

• He started immediately through gaining control over the area through means that were not seen to be legally done

• Theodore Roosevelt would stop at nothing to get the desired effect and vision that he saw.

• Construction started again.

Relationship of the Living Area to the Quality of Work

• Chief Engineer John Stevens decided that before they could continue working on the Panama Canal they would need to improve the living conditions of the workers

• He ordered insecticide and screens to be put up that would keep malaria and yellow fever spreading mosquitoes away.

• They created a community type center for everyone to live in and it became a home away from home

• After the living conditions were acceptable they began to start production on the canal again

• Stevens also decided that they should not dig the canal all the way to sea level; had they attempted to they probably would have failed

• Stevens saw a lot of success during his reign as chief engineer and even oversaw the visit from Teddy Roosevelt

• However, Stevens quit for reasons that are still unclear

Racism in the Canal

• Sadly, a theme of the work done on the Panama Canal was racism

• Foreign blacks were a large majority of the people who worked on the canal

• Unlike their white colleagues they were paid in silver rather than gold

• They were given the most dangerous jobs and were not given the comforts of home that the whites were

• Out of the entire number of people that were killed during the construction of the canal the majority were black foreigners

Los Angeles Aqueduct

• William Mulholland• He was responsible for the Los Angeles

Department of Water and Power• He oversaw the building of the aqueducts and

dams that brought and collected water within Los Angeles that could be used throughout California

• He tended to overlook the long term consequences of his decisions and focused only on getting water into California here and now

Running Dry

• The Los Angeles Aqueduct was 233 miles long

• It pulled water directly from Owens Valley, it was the valley’s only source of water

• Mulholland’s plans to get water no matter what it took lead to the Owens Lake being bled dry

Water Wars

• There was a lot of debate over whether or not Mulholland’s methods were legitimate

• He moved quickly and acted too hastily often angering the people he dealt with

• Began a “war” over water and who should get it and how it should be collected

Mulholland’s End

• Mulholland angered many people, including the farmers whose land he wanted to buy for the expansion of the Los Angeles aqueducts

• He was on bad terms with many people at the time

• His career came to a complete end when the St. Francis Dam that he oversaw collapsed only hours after he had inspected it.