Colonel Gorgas had charge of the forces and he was determined to do the job well. Tracts of the jungle were burned over, ditches to drain stagnant pools were dug, and every barrel was looked after. Hundreds of Negroes with oil cans sprayed almost every nook and corner of the Zone with kerosene. Houses were screened, every case of sickness was looked after, and the result was soon manifest. A mighty victory was won by Gorgas and today the Canal Zone is as healthful as any tropical country on earth. Of course, people criticized and joked about the mosquito brigade, but the colonel went ahead pouring oil upon the water, cleaning up filth, and compelling sanitary measures, paying not the slightest attention to the harping critics.
At the north end of the Zone are the cities of Cristobal and Colon, the latter in Panama. The fact is they are practically one city, the railroad being the dividing line. While Cristobal is clean and beautiful much of Colon is dirty and rum soaked. Somebody said to me: "Colon is that part of the city where you can buy a drink," and it sure looks it.
While it is only about forty miles across the isthmus yet the canal is fifty miles long. The fact is they had to dredge out to deep water which is about five miles at each end. Entering the channel at the north it is about seven miles to the Gatun locks. There are three pairs of these locks and they lift the vessel to Gatun Lake, which is eighty-five feet above sea level. It is twenty-four miles across this lake to Culebra Cut, which extends about nine miles through the hills, and to the first lock on the Pacific side. This lock lowers the ship about thirty feet to Miraflores Lake, which is a little more than a mile in length. Here are two pairs of locks which lowers the ship to sea level and then it is about eight miles or a little more to deep water. Counting all the distance occupied by the locks we have the fifty miles.
Gatun Lake was made by a great dam across the Chagres river. This dam is a stupendous piece of work, being a half mile wide at the bottom, a mile and a half long, and more than one hundred feet high. A gigantic spillway allows the surface water to run over. During the dry season, about four months, the river does not supply enough water to run the locks so Gatun Lake must furnish the supply. This lake at present covers one hundred and sixty-four square miles, and last year it was lowered five feet during the dry season. The land has been purchased for the extension of the lake and the great spillway can be raised twenty feet higher if necessary so that a shortage of water is practically impossible.
Each lock in the canal is a thousand feet long, one hundred and ten feet wide, and the average height about thirty feet, so they hold a tremendous amount of water. Every ship passing through empties two lock chambers full of water into the ocean at each end. It is an interesting fact that at the Atlantic the tide only makes a difference of two and a half feet, at the Pacific side the difference is more than twenty feet. While the low lock gates at the Atlantic side are sixty-four feet high the low lock gates at the Pacific side are eighty-two feet high.
I was permitted to go into the control station tower at the Gatun lock system and see three ships taken through, also into the tunnels below to see the machinery in operation and it is a sight never to be forgotten. To take a ship through these locks the operator sets in motion twice ninety-eight gigantic electric motors and it is all done without an audible word being spoken. Every possible emergency has been provided for. Could an enemy ship by any manner of means get into the canal and undertake to ram the gates it would be helpless as far as any damage is concerned. Mighty chains guard the gates and it is impossible to get the gates closed without these chains being raised to their places. Emergency gates are provided so the water can all be shut off, the locks emptied and repairs made in the bottoms of the lock chambers, if necessary.
At the continental divide the Culebra Cut is almost five hundred feet deep and more than a half mile wide at the top. The channel itself is three hundred feet wide and forty-five feet deep. There have been half a hundred slides and a single one of them brought down an area of seventy-five acres. Think of a seventy-five acre field all sliding in at once, every foot of which had to be dug out!
The worst trouble was when the bottom bulged up from below. Some little time before my visit a large tree came up from the bottom. It had been rolled in by one of those fearful slides and long afterwards came up from the bottom. Somebody has figured out that if all the dirt that has been taken from Culebra Cut was loaded on railroad cars they would, if coupled together, make a train that would reach around the world four times.
The canal cost about four hundred million dollars. The tolls now amount to almost a million dollars a month so it is more than paying expenses. The ship upon which I passed through paid seven thousand dollars toll, but it was one of the largest ships that pass through. Now that the danger from slides is practically over and trade routes are being established it ought to be a paying investment.