THE BIG DITCH
The Panama Canal and the Age of American Empire, 1903-1914By Dorothy Louise Stanhope
Length5h 59m
About this audiobook
August 15, 1914. A small steamer named the Ancon eased into a chamber of gray concrete the size of a city block — and the two great oceans of the world were joined for the first time in history.
The journey to that moment had taken sixty-four years, two failed European empires, a French bankruptcy that ruined a generation of investors, a U.S.-sponsored revolution, and the lives of more than twenty-five thousand workers buried in the mud of the isthmus. By the time the Ancon cleared the final lock, the canal had cost more than any project in American history, transformed the geography of global trade, and announced to the world that a new imperial power had arrived.
But the story most Americans inherited — of plucky engineers, of Theodore Roosevelt's swagger, of yellow fever conquered and a continent split — has always been only half the story. The other half belongs to the Barbadian and Jamaican workers paid in silver while Americans were paid in gold, to a Colombian province annexed by gunboat diplomacy, to a Panamanian nation that spent the next ninety years trying to claw back what was taken from it, and to a small French lobbyist whose theatrical use of a postage stamp may have rerouted the canal itself.
The Big Ditch tells the definitive story of the Panama Canal — the engineering, the empire, the disease, the diplomacy, and the cost. Drawing on archives in Washington, Panama City, Bridgetown, and Kingston, Dorothy Louise Stanhope reconstructs the canal's full arc, from de Lesseps' doomed dream in 1880 to the handover at noon on December 31, 1999. This is history as it actually happened — ambitious, brutal, brilliant, and impossible to put down.
Perfect for readers of David McCullough's The Path Between the Seas, Stephen Ambrose's narrative histories, and Erik Larson's deeply researched true-life epics.
Audiobook details
GenrePoetry, Historical Fiction, Mystery and Thriller
Length5 hrs 59 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1Introduction
2Author’s Note
3Prologue: The Dreams of De Lesseps
4PART ONE: THE ROAD TO PANAMA (1850-1903)
5Chapter 1: The French Failure — De Lesseps, Yellow Fever, and the Collapse of the First Canal
Show all chaptersShow less
6Chapter 2: Nicaragua vs. Panama — The Route Debate and the Lobbyist's Stamp
7Chapter 3: The Hay-Herran Treaty — Colombia's Refusal and Roosevelt's Fury
8Chapter 4: The Panama Revolution — American Warships and Instant Recognition
9PART TWO: BUILDING THE CANAL (1904-1914)
10Chapter 5: The Medical Miracle — Gorgas, Yellow Fever, and the Eradication of Disease
11Chapter 6: Goethals Takes Command — The Army Engineer Who Made the Canal
12Chapter 7: The Culebra Cut — Digging Through the Continental Divide
13Chapter 8: The Locks — Engineering the Water Staircase
14PART THREE: THE WORKERS' CANAL
15Chapter 9: The Silver and Gold Rolls — Racial Segregation on the Canal Zone
16Chapter 10: West Indian Workers — Barbadians, Jamaicans, and the Caribbean Labor Force
17Chapter 11: American Workers — The Silver and Gold Wage System
18Chapter 12: Accidents, Disease, and the Human Cost of Construction
19PART FOUR: THE CANAL ZONE
20Chapter 13: American Empire in Panama — The Canal Zone as Colonial Possession
21Chapter 14: Panamanian Resentment — Sovereignty, Humiliation, and the Growing Conflict
22Chapter 15: The Canal Zone Society — American Life in a Tropical Colony
23Chapter 16: Strategic Value — The Canal and American Naval Power
24PART FIVE: THE OPENING AND EARLY OPERATION
25Chapter 17: The Opening — August 1914 and the War That Overshadowed the Triumph
26Chapter 18: The Canal in World War I and World War II — Strategic Military Value
27Chapter 19: The 1964 Flag Riots — Panamanian Nationalism and the First Crisis
28Chapter 20: The Torrijos-Carter Treaties — Returning the Canal
29PART SIX: LEGACIES
30Chapter 21: Handover — December 31, 1999, and Panamanian Control
31Chapter 22: The Expanded Canal — The Panama Canal Today and the Third Set of Locks
32Chapter 23: American Empire — What the Canal Represents in the History of U.S. Foreign Policy
33Chapter 24: Engineering Legacy — The Canal's Place in the History of Infrastructure
34Epilogue: The Canal at One Hundred
35Acknowledgments
36Selected Bibliography
37About the Author
More from Dorothy Louise Stanhope
The Complete Poetry (The Classic Illustrated Edition)Samuel Taylor Coleridge26h 23m4.6 (1.3K)$1.99 · $0.00
The Weary Blues (Annotated)Langston Hughes2h 13m4.5 (4.6K)$2 · $0.00
The Complete Poetical Works of Edgar Allan Poe (Illustrated)Edgar Allan Poe18h 27m4.5 (4.2K)$2 · $0.00
Stranger MusicLeonard Cohen5h 45m4.5 (3.5K)$20
The Essential Rumi, New Expanded EditionJalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi9h 24m4.5 (56.9K)$20
The Complete Poetry (Annotated)Oscar Wilde6h 44m4.5 (15.5K)$2 · $0.00
Saundarya LahariUnknown Author3h 16m4.6 (256)$18 · $0.00
The Mesnevi (Annotated)Maulana Jalal al-Din Rumi18h 41m4.5 (4.2K)$2 · $0.00
Songs of a SourdoughRobert W. Service2h 13m4.5 (13.6K)$1 · $0.00
Little Flower of Jesus (Annotated)Thérèse of Lisieux5h 4m4.5 (1.4K)$0.99 · $0.00
The Poems of LeopardiGiacomo Leopardi3h 9m4.5 (3.6K)$2 · $0.00
Nikki Giovanni: Love Poems & A Good CryNikki Giovanni2h 44m4.6 (405)$18 · $0.00
The Complete Poetry of Walt Whitman (Annotated)Walt Whitman19h 58m4.5 (4.2K)$0.99 · $0.00
A Year with RumiColeman Barks5h 56m4.5 (2.6K)$24 · $0.00
Complete Poetry of Rudyard Kipling (Annotated)Rudyard Kipling22h 50m4.5 (2.6K)$1.99 · $0.00
The Complete PoemsPaul Laurence Dunbar12h 40m4.5 (1.5K)$21 · $0.00
The Odes of John Keats - Complete CollectionJohn Keats22h 16m4.5 (1.3K)$1 · $0.00
SonnetsWilliam Shakespeare2h 39m4.4 (128.3K)$3 · $0.00
PoemsEdna St. Vincent Millay2h 39m4.5 (1.3K)$2 · $0.00
PoemsW. B. Yeats4h 12m4.4 (45.5K)$2.30
The Labyrinth of the SpiritsCarlos Ruiz Zafon27h 55m4.5 (77.2K)$53 · $0.00
The Things We Cannot SayKelly Rimmer13h 48m4.5 (359.1K)$33 · $0.00
Their Castilian OrphanAnna Belfrage14h 45m4.7 (122)$27
Lieutenant Hornblower (Annotated)C. S. Forester11h 41m4.5 (2.9K)$2 · $0.00
Eagles over BritainLee Jackson12h 26m4.5 (18.6K)$23
Rilla of InglesideLucy Maud Montgomery11h 44m4.5 (48.2K)$2 · $0.00
The Viennese DressmakerKathryn Gauci11h 46m4.5 (2.1K)$23 · $0.00
The Man in the Brown Suit & They Came to BaghdadAgatha Christie15h 43m4.6 (495)$33 · $0.00
Under the Light of the Italian MoonJennifer Anton12h 28m4.5 (5.3K)$23 · $0.00
Jubilee, 50th Anniversary EditionMargaret Walker15h 43m4.5 (9.5K)$25 · $0.00
Arch of TriumphErich Maria Remarque15h 51m4.4 (36.6K)$28
Serenade for NadiaZülfü Livaneli9h 9m4.4 (20.1K)$20
Pride and PrejudiceJane Austen14h 44m4.4 (4.7M)$2 · $0.00
Flying Colours (Annotated)Cecil Louis Troughton Smith9h 26m4.4 (10.1K)$2 · $0.00
With Love from HarlemReShonda Tate13h 48m4.5 (2K)$6 · $0.00
Under the Java MoonHeather B. Moore12h 23m4.4 (3.2K)$23
FamilyJ. California Cooper4h 43m4.4 (3.6K)$15
Rilla of InglesideL. M. Montgomery12h 25m4.4 (67.5K)$2 · $0.00
Death Comes for the Archbishop (Annotated)Willa Cather9h 13m4.4 (4.7K)$2 · $0.00
The Long Knives Are CryingJoseph M. Marshall III19h 2m4.5 (351)$32
CollateralBrian Andrews, Jeffrey Wilson13h 8m4.6 (7K)$23
The ReunionJana Deleon6h 31m4.6 (1.6K)$26 · $0.00
Animal 3K’wan6h 33m4.6 (2.8K)$20
To Hold and ProtectSandra Owens7h 59m4.6 (1.1K)$8 · $0.00
Extinction WarNicholas Sansbury Smith12h 1m4.6 (6K)$23
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (Complete Edition)Arthur Conan Doyle12h 28m4.6 (286.7K)$2 · $0.00
Savy WisdomPeggy McColl2h 53m4.7 (448)$15
3 a.m. Premium: Books 1–5Nick Pirog15h 27m4.6 (8.2K)$25
Farewell My Lovely (Annotated)Raymond Chandler10h 37m4.6 (1.2K)$2 · $0.00
The Labyrinth of the SpiritsCarlos Ruiz Zafon27h 55m4.5 (77.2K)$53 · $0.00
Tracing Killer EvidenceJodie Bailey5h 46m4.7 (242)$12 · $0.00
Sign of the MakerBrian Shea7h 13m4.6 (2.5K)$17
No Sin UnpunishedLynDee Walker7h 43m4.6 (1.4K)$17
Sherlock HolmesMade for Success14h 22m4.5 (4.3K)$25
Sons of War 4: SoldiersNicholas Sansbury Smith, Tom Abrahams12h 54m4.6 (507)$25
Murder in the TowerRoy Lewis8h 23m4.6 (784)$20
Glen AffricKarine Giebel22h 51m4.5 (3.2K)$46 · $0.00
Deadly Badlands PursuitSharee Stover5h 53m4.6 (361)$12 · $0.00
Crime and Punishment (The Unabridged Garnett Translation) (Annotated)Fyodor Dostoevsky24h 25m4.5 (15.4K)$0.99 · $0.00
Who Killed the Earl of Moran?Stephanie Laurens8h 46m4.6 (340)$23
You may also like
Cadillac Desert, Revised and Updated EditionMarc Reisner27h 56m4.4 (13.6K)$30
Cat TaleCraig Pittman9h 45m4.3 (1.6K)$29 · $0.00
Water to the AngelsLes Standiford9h 11m4.0 (1.4K)$29 · $0.00
Panama FeverMatthew Parker15h 8m4.1 (1.7K)$30
Atoms and AshesSerhii Plokhy12h 8m4.2 (2.6K)$23
The Great HungerCecil Woodham-Smith18h 23m4.3 (2.3K)$28
Summary of Silent SpringRachel Carson2h 29m4.2 (82.5K)$7 · $0.00
A Crack in the Edge of the WorldSimon Winchester12h 31m4.0 (10.6K)$33 · $0.00
A Wolf Called RomeoNick Jans9h 49m4.3 (6.3K)$29 · $0.00
Colter’s JourneyWilliam W. Johnstone, J. A. Johnstone9h 20m4.4 (1.7K)$20
Life with Wildlife - 2, ADr M.K. Ranjitsinh7h 52m4.6 (29)$8
A Brief History of Forestry (Annotated)B. E. Fernow14h 20m$0.99 · $0.00
Landscapes of LossKavitha Iyer9h 45m4.4 (146)$16 · $0.00
Cork: Its Origin and Industrial UsesGilbert Erwin Stecher1h 16m$2 · $0.00
In Deep WaterPeter Lehner4h 26m3.5 (116)$12 · $0.00
The Settlement of Illinois, 1778-1830Arthur Clinton Boggess8h 48m$2 · $0.00
Practical Forestry in the Pacific NorthwestE. T. Allen4h 57m$1 · $0.00
The Cradle of Mankind; Life in Eastern KurdistanEdgar Thomas Ainger Wigram, W. A. Wigram10h 15m$2 · $0.00
The Yellowstone National Park: Historical and DescriptiveHiram Martin Chittenden11h 39m4.2 (217)$1 · $0.00
LatitudeNicholas Crane6h 35m3.9 (576)$17