Both the French and the American efforts build a sea-level canal through Panama linking the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean are presented in this episode; firstly, the ill-fated effort by Ferdinand de Lesseps, the builder of the Suez Canal, to construct the canal, which - derailed by the ravages of tropical diseases (which decimated the workforce to the tune of over 22,000 men) and the impossibilities of constructing a sea-level canal through the mountains - saw financial scandals that ruined his reputation and brought down the French government. The episode then takes up the story seventeen years later, after the United States took up the challenge and, after leading a concentrated effort to eradicate the causes of the tropical diseases and switching from a sea-level to a lock-system canal, triumphantly saw the linking of the Pacific and the Atlantic.
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