For millions of people after 1914, the crossing at Panama would be one of life’s memorable experiences. The complete transit required about twelve hours, and except for the locks and an occasional community along the shore, the entire route was bordered by the same kind of wilderness that had confronted the first surveyors for the railroad. Goethals had determined that the jungle not merely remain untouched, but that it be allowed to return wherever possible. This was a military rather than an aesthetic decision on his part; the jungle he insisted before a congressional committee was the
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