A Shortcut for a Shortcut

In response to yesterday's post on the onetime vogue for mining-by-nuke, a treasured commenter asked:

I remember a rumor that someone proposed building an alternative to the Panama Canal (perhaps even at sea level) using nuclear explosives. Did you find any evidence of that in your research?

Indeed we did! This was actually the pet concept of Edward Teller, the man behind the H-bomb. In the interests of harnessing nuclear explosives for peaceful purposes, he founded Project Ploughshare. The...