The Panama Canal – How the Gold Rush Led to the World’s Greatest Project

09-13-22

Episode Transcription

Made by robots, for robots. Only read if you're weird.

Hey, man, what's going on? Oh, not much. How was California? Oh, I'm a blue haired hippie liberal. Now you know. I went. Yeah, the audio listeners. I have a lot of piercings on my face now you know. Um, no, it was great. I had a good time. I feel like trash because I did. It was nine days of vacation. We did two days in Vegas, two days of a family wedding. Oh Gosh. Have you ever had a Disney corn dog? Oh Gosh, I'm not joking. I'm not joking to Disney. Have you ever had you've had a fair grown court dog, court dog, corn dog, like a fairground, but that's like gross. I mean it's it tastes amazing. Taste amazing. No, no, no, here's what I'm saying. Taste amazing, but you know that the hygiene of the corn dog trailer at a county fair is probably a bar. Yeah, I ordered something that drive through the other day and it was early, like probably ten am, and the guy handed me and my food and his fingers looked like he had been changing oil all day and I was like you can keep it, you can keep my kee, keep my money, keep that belongs to you now oil hands. All right, that guy's name is court dog. So Um, no, you don't talk about like the deliciousness of a good county fair corn dog's tasty. Add Disney money behind that so that you trust the hygiene of it. So there's like that layer of like am I gonna die when I eat this is gone. So now you're just enjoying a corner and now it's just good and I ate quite a few. I'm jealous of that. That sounds great. Oh, what a good time. I feel. I feel disgusting. I've had milkshakes and Burgers and pizza and now that was my nine days of vacation and this morning I just breathed real heavy for unch for the week and I was like wow, I was thinking about health advice because I've been getting a lot of like tiktoks of like, you know, here's, here's how to eat healthy, whatever, and it is all over the place. Yeah, we we, we need to call this out, because we're not. We can leave it in, I guess. Uh, we're just doing tangents and I feel like you're gonna be like so, anyway, have you heard of aliens? Anyway, Oh, I saw it in your eyes. Godly, let's just get to it. Alright, roll the theme. Tim Texts me no context and just said I'm about to fight ever one of our Patriot supporters, and it was the Eiffel Towers. There's two of them. There's a sing shot, which is fitting because that was exactly a hundred years after France. Real, happy, okay, happy, okay. Things I learned last night. Okay, health stuff, okay. There's these dudes out here who are just like, every morning I eat eight Burger patties with the alvida cheese poured all over it, Bacon. The only thing is just don't eat the Bun. You know, you can like and like. That's their health advice. But the next video was a girl who was like yeah, I had four raspberries and for dinner I'm gonna eat a tic TAC and like that's what and he's just like this is so polar opposite. It's because nobody knows what they're doing. That's what I'm saying. It's all made up, like nothing real, but it is insane to me that like those, you know, big macro kind of guys that are just like yeah, it's all about getting the macro's Hi fat, like the Keto stuff, is just disgusting food, and they're just like, yeah, this is healthier than's like yogurt and for you. Yeah, yeah, but there. So my diet, you know, I have lost a hundred pounds. I don't know if I've talked about it before. Um, but if you eat, don't eat county fair corn dogs, but Disney corn dogs dogs. My Diet is whatever you want. Whatever you want. Makes some NACHOS, put some Mac and cheese on your nachos with a little bit of Cholula hot sauce. But the key, here's the here's the key. If you want to lose weight, listen to till, the podcast while you eat. Helps you digest differently, moves it through your system, cleans it out. The cleanest way to eat. Yeah, and we're just allowed to say it because all of it's made up. Anyway, what we're talking about? Have you ever heard of the Panama Canal? What have you heard the Panama Canal? Yeah, I guess. Is that what we're doing? Yeah, okay, yeah, don't worry, I can work aliens into there. They the idea. Okay, they said, you know what, this stretch of land needs river, river. The other English isn't great. Yeah, they're still learning. Uh. No, okay. So the Panama Canal, uh, you've probably heard of it. It's a canal that runs through Panama right here. Yeah, I love, love how we're saying Panama. How would you say Panama, Panama? How would you say Panama? Panama, Panama, Panama. We're saying that. Whatever. It's fifty miles long. Basically, there's a stretch of Panama where, uh, right there in the middle, the continents really really short earthan and Um, somewhere along the line of history, someone was like hey, this would be a great way to get through the country if the country wasn't there, UM, like for sailing. And that person was Charles, the fifth in four. He had this dream of turning part of this literal continent into a river so he could take his boats through it. So they were like, all right, let's dig it out. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he had this dream, and so he actually like contracted some of his like engineers and architects to figure out if it was possible, and they said there's not a prince in the world who has the resources to pull this off, and he was like yeah, but what about a kick a thing? I'm not a prince. Prince, you losers. And for uh, really like two hundred years there had been dreams. One guy out there with a shovel. Two Hundred Years. Really, for about two hundred and fourteen years, there was Daniel Mayan, Daniel out there in the Panama Canal. Charles was like, you don't we'll pay you a lot if you did it, and he did it. The six will follow up with it. Don't worry, because they'll all be there will always be a Charles Um to pay you out there wasn't um so. And then there's just this long line of people who had this dream. Thomas Jefferson was one of them. In seventeen sixty eight he said it would be really nice if this country wasn't um and we could just take our boats through there, and that was a direct quote. It would be really nice if this country wasn't I want to take our boats directly through it. Signed Thomas Jefferson. He signed everything he said. Signed. Yeah, what if we did that too? Yeah, that's a great idea. Signed Jared Myers. Yeah, WE'RE gonna sign the end of a campaign video. So so what? What was with Charles the eighth or whatever, Charles the Um, Charles the fifth, in what year, was like let's cut this thing in half. Four, and then two years later, Tamis Jeffersone's like that. It was a good idea. Yeah, continually people just kept saying, Hey, like remember what Charles said, we should do that. But then everyone was like yeah, but remember all the people who paid to figure that out, and they said we can't do that, so we can't do it. And so they kept like sending surveyors and people to try to figure this out. But in Um eighteen, just off the whim of one guy who was like yeah, I bet we could cut that place in half pretty much nice. Uh. In the forties there was this thing called the gold rush and everybody was going across the continent to California to get some gold. Here's the problem. If you looking for last week, you know in some in some neighborhood in L A, just digging. I'm looking for gold, for gold. Um. Here's the thing. If you successfully, I don't know if you know this, if you successfully made it across the organ trail, Um, you're probably the last one you know that made it. If you succeed everybody died if you got gold. Here's the here's this rough part about this scenario, that you have to get there. You gotta take it back to sell it, and getting across, back, across, that's a tall order. I know. I played the game. And so there was this issue with the gold rush where everybody who was finding gold was struggling to sell their goal because they only had each other. Yeah, and there I got all those gold and I was like yeah, yeah, I don't want to. We're the only two people who made it. We both have yeah, well, you want to buy some. What do you wanna do with this gold? Well, one day I'd like to cut a country in half. To be honest, it's actually pretty close. UH, they said. They said, you know, traveling all the way across America is tough. Um, even today it's still tough. It's the worst bad drive. Um, but imagine doing that in in the freaking forties. And so someone was like, you know what, it would be easier to sail to the east coast through through the Panama Canal. But but there was the isthmus of Panama. But you ever named that? I hate them. Isthmus, Isthmus Isthmus Isthmus I need to bring something up. Um, please do I don't know. You've been distant because of your vacation, which is great. Enjoy your vacation. Disconnect, it's fine. Remember the last nine days. Yeah, were you talking about distant? You've been distant, or you really discord crap, Oh man, there has been a full war in the discord since you've been gone. Um, you just don't we got to book that out, uh, by the time this episode comes out. A few weeks ago there was an episode where I used the phrase white rabbit. Um, what you meant was red herring. No, I met white rabbit. Um. Our patrons seems to think that a white rabbit and a red herring are different concepts, but they are the same. Um, there's a there's a ven diagram, there's a there's a red herring. I want you to know, listen, that Tim texts me no context and just said I'm about to fight every one of our patron supporters and I thought, Tim, this is it, this is Tim's Day of reckoning. They found an old tweet. You know he's going down and uh, nope, Sir enough, it's just Tim's pride getting in the way here's the there's a thing, there's a D it's just a red herring. There's a diagram for red herrings, right, and you got the red herring and that is here, and then you've got the they overlap. There's a moment where, if they're different, if something's a red herring, it's throwing you off the scent, but if you don't follow it, it stays a red herring. It's just a red herring. A white rabbit is when you've chased the rabbit, and so a red herring becomes a white rabbit when you begin to follow that trail, even though it's false. Um, a white rabbit and be true, though a white rabbit can be just a waste of time. That's true, but not like doesn't get you where you need to go. I'm pretty sure the white rabbits. The thing that would make a difference is that the red herring is a true thing, but it has no relevance to the topic at hand. The white rabbit is a false trail that you followed. Yeah, may be right. Even still, all this, everything we've gone through, you pausing an episode to discuss the red herring white rabbit debate and me calmly explaining. Here's the small difference, and you win. I guess we should cut it out. But here's the thing. So now we have a new threead and we have a new thing. I started this morning. I don't know. That's what I'm saying. You're so into this. Yeah, I've changed my user name in the discord to the Lord of the rabbits. Yeah, and I declared up. You don't at Gmail Dot Com, Lord of the rabbits at Gmail Dot Com. Do you know what I have that? That's pretty crazy. It's only I wanted to meet the Lord of the rabbits. Oh well, here I am. Science seal delivered. So so, basically, you need to decide which party are you and are you a herring or are you a rabbit? I'm part of the hair and herd. H You, and you have to throw. You have to throw your Emoji in your user name so we can identify you in the discord Um anyway. So there's a full war. I don't know how it's gonna Resolve, but I'm losing a lot of money. I'M gonna I'm drunk for power right now. All right, if you're interested in the Panama Panama Canal. I'm really sorry that you've listened to all this. Sorry, sorry, we followed that White Rabbit speaking of the drug for power. Um, these people wanted to sell their gold and be really rich. Uh. So what they started doing is they took their boats for in California and they rode them across the ocean to Panama, to the Isthmus of Panama. And what they said is there's a port on both sides of this isthmus. If we it's easier for us to travel across. Yeah, it's a it's a fifty mile trip across. So they'll port, get everything out, take the fifty mile trip, hit the other part, take another boat up to new with all their stuff, make a bunch of money. That sounds like a bottleneck for gold thieves. Oh yeah, that's a good place to hang out if you want to rob people. Oh Yeah, if you want to get some t VP. Where is it now? Just curious. I don't know. When I was we were driving, I used to tell people that, well, that's a great place to hanging out if you're trying to rob people. We were driving around. Oh yeah, there's the West Toronto building, there's the World War One real that alleyway, great place to hide out. Yeah, that's my that's my rob stop right there. So pretty good. Oh my God. Okay, Hey, thanks for checking out this episode. If you like this podcast you wanted more of it, please leave a review. That's super helpful to let others know who are searching for a podcast. And if you're new around here, we've been doing this for several years and there's plenty of episodes to check out. One of my personal favorites is agent Garbo. Is a guy who went to the government during World War Two and was like hey, let me be a double agent and they were like no, and then he was like well, I'm gonna and so he kind of went off on his own did the thing. It's also got some crazy details about world war two, about how the US use inflatable tanks to trick Germany, all kinds of fun stuff, but if you want to go check that out, you can. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. But here's the thing. Uh, it was still I think. Here's the thing that here's what happens when you get a lot called. Here's what happens when you become really rich overnight, but you can't spend your money, yet you begin to taste or your mouth salivates with the dreams of what the life you're about to have it. Oh, dude, yeah, me, as soon as I stepped on the Delta Sky Club, like I'm not, like, I'm not like rich, but like I get up there and I go, Oh, yeah, you're said, this is an unlimited buffet. Yeah, I'm pretty I'm pretty sure you texted me a picture of your food and you said this is why the rich are so disconnected from all of us Poors. Yes, because they get tacos. And I showered at the airport. They get tacos in the shower at the dude, I was in the airport taking a shower and for a moment I thought, oh, man, like I can, I can never go back, you know, and that's that's that's how it must have felt have a boat full of gold rolling up to Panama. Yeah, so they roll in their boat and then I can get it. And I'm making fun of the hold the Panama. You say Panama the way George W Bush says nuclear. Say Panama, Normal Panama, Panama, Panama. We're saying it the same way. There's a venn diagram a Panama, Panama. So you got your gold, you poured it one side of Panama. Yeah, and then they said it would be really nice this fifty mile walk, we have to do gold, if we could just not have to walk that, because they are already getting used to not walking. Um. And so what they did is they paid locals to carry them. Is they got the United States to build a railroad. You just went on without it. I was like really, I was like, okay, how many golds would you need? Come here across the isthmus? And it's still Daniel who was sent back in time from quick books. He's now he's a carrier. You know he's freaking did you say it from quick books? Remember that. It's a call back, but that's fine. Yeah, your brains dumb. So, anyway, there's our listeners got it because they're intelligent. Well, joined the rabbit. Um. So they build a railroad. Do you guys built the railroad. Um, and things went great, because now the US did it, because they were like, we can get all that gold money. Yeah, great, they wanted the gold money and they said we're powerful than you, so we can just put a railroad in your country and you can't stop us. Um, what it really what really happened, was more of a hey, this is good for your nation, because now a bunch of stuff is happening here. Um, yeah. So they were like, we'll build the railroad if you let us do it, and you got they're like, no more gold robbery. Um. So they built the railroad, but here's the problem. They built that railroad and then they realized, man, this is still pretty inefficient, because we're docking, we're unloading, loading the train, riding the train just to load another ship. And then they're like, man, Charles was right, this should be cut in half. We should just cut this country in half. And so a lot of people were floating the ideas back and forth, Um, and someone called this dude in France. He was like, Hey, cut it in half, and then someone was like no, no, they can have it. That's that's the Rema, that's the Panama. That's another Bible joke. Sorry, guys. So somebody called Ferdinand de lesseps. He's a French dude, Um, most known for building the Suez Canal, and he succeeded at that and got a little too confident. Um, he was like, he's like pick some land, I'll turn it into a yeah, yes, we canal. Did you say? I can? Now? I can, I can. Uh. And so he was really confident that he could turn this into a canal. Um, here's the issue about Um, the difference between the Suez and the Panama Canal, though, are the isthmus of Suremou at this point. Um, Panama. Uh, it was a very mountainous region with thousands of feet in elevation. Raised between this fifty Mile Span, Suez is just an empty desert, and so they just dig. It was flat. You do straight through desert. There's no elements, no climate, is just kind of hot. Um, Panama, rainforest, uh, mountains, bugs, snakes, bugs and snakes and stuff. Yeah, it's it's different. It's a different scenario. But he was confident. He was like, here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna come here and we're just gonna dig straight to sea level through all these mountains and then we're gonna have ourselves a canal. And Uh, what year was this? Eighteen eighty one was when he started. So they I mean so in the eighteen forties of the gold rush. This whole time, how soon did the gold rush. Did they start running things around down through Panama? I don't know how soon they started running them. I know they they built the railroad in eighteen fifty. Okay, so it's been by thirty years of the railroad doing its job. And they're like, guys, this is like this is fine, but you know, it could be fine. You know, it could be there. Guys, this is big, but it can be bigger. Yeah, I have more, we could have more. And so uh lisps is like taking tiggle through the mountains all the way to the bottom, just a lot. Just take a dig and really get his hands in the dirt, just dig, digging all the way down there, getting all the way down to the sea level. And Stop. Eiffel. You might know him from his tower, the Statue of Liberty. Oh, no, yeah, you're right, Eiffel Tower. No, yeah, he built the Eiffel Tower. He built it. Yeah, well, he designed it. He was like, what if we, the people who get named after they don't do the work? They what if we built the tower? And they were like, he said, what would that do for tourist attraction? It was two sides of where the canal would be and it was the Eiffel Towers. There's two of them. There's a sling shot. He's like, we sling shut the boat across the the guy who made the eiff what about giant sling shot? No bad idea, and he said, I still built one and I guess we'll put it in France. I'm already halfway down with those projects. I'm already halfway done. You can't build the rest. And so that's it's just one side of a sling shot. The Eiffel Tower is half a slingshot. Is What your theory is. That was his idea. It was a little bit better. It was. It was the fifties, though. You know, you can't fault him, and you can't fault him. It was a little mouse in his hair. It was building. No, Eiffel was like. was like, bro He told Lips. He said, lesps, you're gonna try to dig through the mountains to sea level, like that's it's like literally ten thou feet of digging Um for fifty miles. And he's like this is gonna take forever and probably work. Well, Um, he's like. He's like he said what you need to do is you need to bring the ocean up the mountains and liceps was like, you idiot, do you hear what you're saying? You can't take the ocean up. He's like, we need to bring the land to the ocean. You can't take the ocean up. So you didn't listen to him. Um. So they started digging and uh, it took a while. They spent, uh, let's see here, um, eighteen years spent digging. Um, they didn't finish. They spent two and eighty seven million dollars in that day's money and equivalent of ten point two billion dollars today, just digging to not finish. Here's the problem. Here's the problem. It failed because, um, they were digging through these mountains and so they were regularly um having these mud slides that were literally filling it back in. Um. They're also because what happened is it's in the middle of a room. I told you, so I can start second tower. We can do we can begin step shot fools pride. I guess we we so the other issue was because they were in the rainforest. What was happening was they would have these big mud floods and then the bottom of these ravines would get very moist and then a bunch of mosquitoes would come and bite the workers and give them Hillaria, and so it became this rampant issue among the workers. They're dying. Yeah, by the end of the project, due to one malaria, two heat exhaustion and three getting buried in these mud floods, two workers died. Holy Cow. So a massive like over how long we're eighteen years, eighteen years, and it feels like a thousand people a year. It feels like somewhere along those lines somebody should have said hey, this isn't going well, this isn't going great, guys, Um. Well, that's what I'm saying. It is like the pride gets in the way of this. It has to work, and there is there is too, like once, once something like that happens, like once you cross a certain thresholds, like we got to do it for them, we have to make it worth then they died in vain if we don't do this. Yeah, and so really they did. That's so annoying. Well, not really. I mean there's so the French ended up pulling the plug and actually took liceps and a bunch of his organization. They made them declare bankruptcy and actually put him on trial. For it because they said that they weren't truth. Yeah, they didn't think this through, Um, but there was one guy in their organization, organization by the name of Philippe, but now of Aria, who didn't get in trouble, I don't know why, Um, and he stayed there and he said, you know what, I believe in this canal and I think this canal can now, uh canal, and the can in canal. So he was like, he was like, I cannot give up on this canal. I'm sticking, sticking back here and making sure it happens. So he started like digging by himself, day in, day out, nonstop. Still out there. He's predicting to this day. Uh No. So he started devising a plan of how he was going to make this happen. Meanwhile, the whole time that's going on, the US is like the friends are gonna pull this off. That's not good. We need to pull this off. Eighties still right. Yeah, who's WHO's in charge? I mean right now it is still kind of a hodgepodge. Like the U S has their independence, but they haven't rose to the prominence that are about to rise to Um. So, like they're still like climbing. There is a hodgepodge of European nations that have a lot of power. The U S has a lot of power. Um. That's kind of where all the power lies. Um. And so the US is like, we need that canal because if we control that, we control a lot of shipping across the planet and we'll get really rich. And so they defies the plan to build Nicaragua Canal. And so there's a stretch of land and their thought was through Nicaragua it's a much larger stretch of land, but it's not as mountainous, so there's a much more flat land through it. There are mountains that they have to do through, but much less mountains. There was also a giant lake in the middle of this stretch. So if they could just make it to the lake and then get on the other side of day can make it across to the ocean, then it would be theoretically smooth ceiling. Um. Okay. So they said we need to build the Nicaragua Canal. So they have been doing all their surveying, doing all the research, doing all our studies, sing out their plan right. They're making it pretty far in the process and then Nicaragua. was like, Philip, you a US Nicaragus, like we're right here, like we would say no to this. So long ago, you would have just asked what. We would have told you know, hey, I was just planning on digging a river in your backyard. Already, got all the things priced out, got a contractor they're actually here to get started. Um. And you're like you're excited about that or not? No, uh. And so Philippe, he says, so Philippe. Philippe says the US is our last chance of pulling off the Panama Canal. And he says we gotta get them off this Nicaragua idea. And so he goes. He calls it the president and he says, Hey, I see you thinking about the president of the time. I don't know, I don't know. I don't remember anybody before Georgia. I'm pretty sure it was Roosevelt all that. Uh. I'm like, Oh, mckinney, okay, McKinley, McKinley, I was gonna say it's not. He's from Ohio. Um, so so he so, Philip. Yes, so phelipe calls up, the president is like Hey, you think about this Nicaragua Canal? Thing. Cool idea, great idea, but he's like, but have you guys noticed all the volcanoes? Who just thought about the it's really bad there, you know. Have you thought about the real estate there? Have you talking about who long term investment? Like, yeah, you're not gonna get a lot in your won't get a big return. About you are? Oh, I thought. Have you seen him? Nicaraguan rivers in Zillo Lake? Think about it. You've seen a lot in Panama. Hey, thanks again for listening to this episode. If you like our show, make sure you follow us on social at tilling podcast or subscribe anywhere where you're listening to right now, whether that's Youtube, spotify or apple podcast, whatever it is. And if you want more, we do have a patreon you can support us on. In there you get all sorts of perks like add free episodes, early access to our content and even a discord with our hosts and producers. So We'd love for you to check that out. All you gotta do is text till into six, six, six six. That's till into six six eight six six. But thanks again for checking us out. So phelipe was like, Hey, McKinley, you're trying to build this canal through Nicaragua. What if he said, have you guys thought about the volcanoes? And they said no, and he said, yeah, there's a lot of volcanoes over there. I didn't need to blow up a bunch like you need to watch out for them. Sure, and so like this is like whenever one of our female friends will start dating some dude heart volcanoes, though, like somebody yould go to his living room. He's just got a bunch of paper mache volcanoes, like hundreds of people like you as volcanoes, though. That's a red flag, you know. You go to you go to somebody's house and they's got paper mache volcanoes over lots of but have you considered the volcano? He's got a room full of volcanoes. And so this guy, you would like, this guy. Um, he starts because he wasn't sure if, like, they were convinced yet. So he starts sending a bunch of letters to just different officials in the government that were like involved in the volcanoes, photoshops pictures of their volcanoes and their families and just trying to make it a letter from the volcano. Don't build them. Don't come into Karagua. You know what to do. That's what it says. It's really threatening letters from volcano. It is volcano in Nicaragua has been threatening me, like me and my family. Yeah, I can't fly. The volcano knows my kid's names. I'm a volcano. My Dad was a volcano, his dad was a volcano. All hailed a volcano. Okay, so you know he's much more subtle. So he would send these letters like of like honest communication type letters. Right, sure, but he I don't know where he found these, but he found Nicaragua had a set of stamps that had volcanoes on them, and so he would send these letters to like with these its just like hey, happy birthday, oh my God, volcanoes in Nicarag wouldn't you see the stamp? Have you seen the stamps? Nicarag was stamps volcanoes on them. So eventually, man, Hey, McKinley, what even thinking about lately? This is just thinking about volcanoes. He's dreaming about him. He's wake up a mill of night and so he started having the conversations. He's guys. You know, they're famous for him. It's almost already built. The volcanoes they're almost already erupt um the earth. Already built the volcane. You haven't even started building your river. We've got a river almost done. Half, yeah, we just see the other half ship. Or we also we have half a river and half a sling shot. Whichever was so many ideas. whichever. What do you want? You can have and build that. And so eventually he convinced the US, and the US was like, okay, how do we pull this off? And he said, don't worry, let me go talk to the Pandemonians. I hate how smooth you said it. That's what got me. I need to go talk to the Pandemonians. Okay, ahead. So he calls him up and shows up there and he starts setting them stamps book he does on them, and they're like, I don't understand the context of this job. Okay, he said, I'm just trying to get rid of stamps now, I go too many of them. At the time, Panama was in his own country. There was the WHO who ruled it. There was the Panamanian people, Um, and they what are they called? I'm really I'm pretty sure Panamanian. Okay, Panamese. Panamanian. I'm like Panamanian Um. Pandemonium. Dude, this is just one of his educated guesses. This is like really, it's just a Greek God statue. He's pretty confident. It's Panamanian Um. They were a people that were there and then Colombia was like hey, you're us now, and they're like no, we're not, and they're like yes, you are, and so then they're so this at the time was like my mom asks, you're one of us. How much do I have to pay you for you to be my girlfriend for this wedding? You know, I mean we have another island. I mean, yeah, we have a whole other people group. They're on another island. You would theresa. It's going really well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we're happy. Uh, Huh, great, this is awful. So the someone says they're happy, late, really happy. Okay, happy, okay. It was like like what do you guys been up to lately? Just being happy, just love. It's very happy. Yeah, we're never going to see her again, are we? It's a Panama's bitter about the whole work Columbian now things, uh, and columbmonium. I'm I'm pretty positive. And so felippe shows up to the Panamanians. What if we could get you to where you were Panamanian and not Columbimonian, and they were like that would be great, like that would bring Pantamonia. This just did. Bantamon is seceded from club parmonium. This okay. So they said that would be awesome, but we don't know how we're gonna do that because Colombia has a military we do not. And he said, Hey, guess what, you know the United States. And they were like, like that really big country. They're like yeah, they want to help you, and they're like no way, and he was like way. He said Hang Out, wait for my signal, and they were like deal, and so then he went to the US and he said okay. The panamins said their mom said that. If your mom says yes, then you can say the night were there, they said he said, Hey, look the Pantom Pana Panamanians. They said, you can build the canal, the catches. They want to be their own country and so they're gonna revolt from Colombia. They need you to stop them from getting reinforcements to Panama. And they're like, we can hang, we can handle them in our country. We just can't handle their reinforcements, and so the US was like, yeah, that'll be easy, and so they take their gun ships and just park it outside of Panama. And then Philippe caused the Panamanians. He sends them one stamp with a volcano and then they revolt. They do the thing to get back to Colombia. Columbia is like, Oh, we need to go to reinforcements. They take their boats, they see the American gun ships and they said, hey, we don't care that much, it's fine. Yeah, no, yeah, I was. I was driving over here anyway. We were just looking at in the neighborhood. That's wild. Yeah, yeah, no, I was just I was door dashing. Yeah, sorry, sorry, we're I'm heading home. Yeah, I gotta get out here here. Yeah, that's UH. So. Yeah, Panama became a country. The United States with the first country to recognize them as a country. Um, and then the United States was like cool, build the canal now, and they're like cool, yeah, I do that, and then they built the canal. UH, they finished it in nineteen fourteen, Um, and it was very disappointing for the canal people because the canal people. Yeah, well, right before the war, right before World War One, all these people just started coming out of the canal. They called the Canal People's. No one knows where they came from. The yeah, well, wear one was canal people's Um. Now the canal people uh, like, who built it? They planned this big ceremony where they're gonna in fine. Also, at this point it's who has built it? This is the American government's paying for it. Yeah. Yeah, so they the United States and they hired Felipe Felippe, and Phelippe actually called his old friend lecepsceps this time was like yeah, maybe we should do that thing where you was like, Oh, yeah, I'm actually in prison for killing two people. So I don't think my ideas are the best. Yeah, and the the US was like we got gunships, we can get you out of in Um, and I don't know how that happened, but anyways. Yeah, so he came in. Well, he didn't actually come, he just kind of from France told everyone what to do. Um, but anyways, they he said Look, sea level rivers dumb, uh, mountain level rivers cool, and so he built these locks, which, do you know how the Panmic now works? It's you're saying that like you do know, I'm serious. It's pretty smart. So what they do is they bring the boats in and there is the calm locks and it's almost like an air lock, and so it locks in and then what happens is there is another lock that is a higher level water and it drains in and then matches the level of the water and then the gate opens and it goes through and closes and it just repeats this over and over as it raises the sea level of the canal until they understand. Okay, let me explain it again. Do you have a visual I'm kind of serious. Do you have a visual? Um, let me grab one. Essentially, what they're doing is, have you ever had like two cups and you like poured from one cup and made them the same height? Yes, that's what they're doing over and over again until they get up to the highest height in the mountain and then they've got a canal all the way across that highest height. Then they get to the other side and they reverse the process. Okay, but how do they get the water up there? So here, let me get you get your graphic, because it didn't fill with the rain. Now there's a lake at the top. Is that real? I'm having trouble picturing this. Let me get you. Let me get your graphic. I need to get one that's a little bit more this show was hosted by two idiots. Okay, so boats come in, this thing shuts off the water. Yeah, so there's there's a gate on both sides something. Yeah, it was finished. They started in one. So there's two gates. The gate that they came in from closes behind them. The Gate in front of them is already closed, and then they get in there. And then what happens is, if you're well, start at the left. You're coming from the Atlantic Ocean. You go through the Gaton locks, and so that first one is the same level as sea level. You get in there, the gate closes behind you and it goes up really high, and then the next level, the water lower. Water level lowers to where the water levels even, but it's higher than what it was before, and so it lifts the boat up and once it's even, then they open up that gate and then the boat goes through, the gate closes and then they repeat this process over and over again. So you're raising an altitude just a little bit every time you're going through until you're at the altitude of this Gattoon Lake and then it goes all the way through and then reverses the process where now it's descending the water level. So that's empowered by how are you doing with gates? It's just pumps, so they're just pumping the water through. So there's like underground pumps that are pumping water through the next gate and there's a guy, there's a there's they got a troll that was probably steam powered. Steam was the thing at the time. That's very interesting. Okay, it's pretty crazy, and this is still functions today. There's a lot more like like electricity and computers and stuff now, but it's the same concept in the water. Yeah, they get shocked. This one was super electric. Okay, yeah, it's pretty smart Um. And so that was the idea to go up the mountain instead of dig to sea level, because you can see in this graphic, if they dug to sea level there's still a lot more dirt to dig out. That would take some time. It's really, really clever, and so the people who built it were super proud of it. This is honestly one of the most impressive engineering marvels in recent hits. That's what I'm saying, that it's pretty crazy, really, really, very, very impressive. I think why? There's a lot. I thought on this day hotel the other day if, like, if civilization fell apart. I mean I know how wheels work, you know, but I don't know how like axles. I couldn't like yeah, yeah, it's like there's a lot of there's a lot of stuff like, oh my gosh, yeah, that's how the bronzes claps happened. I was thinking about you know what I thought about it. I was looking at as in the hotel and I was like, how is this elevator working? I was like, because it's it's doing different weights. But like, anyway, that's impressive. People are smarter than us. People are smarter than us. Man, so stupid. But so they play in this big event, right, and they were. They invited every nation in the world to come look at the cool thing that they built and they had a really fancy boat that they were going to take the whole trip on and everyone was gonna be like a parade. Everyone's gonna be on the side with their flags and their cigarettes and their fireworks. Uh, just like celebrating the whole thing right the day that they planned. It was literally, gives you not like two weeks after World War One started. And so people were like, I don't want to go. If they're going, you tell me they're gonna be there. No, yeah, so they canceled it. And so, because this happened, it wasn't the first ship that traveled through. Wasn't this like pretty boat. It was like a United States warship. Um, Nice. So, which is pretty fitting given how they got the United States. Yea. Um. And so they built that. Uh. And then the Panama Canal since then has had a pretty rocky history. Uh. The US, after they built that, was like this is now the canal zone and that's a part of our country, and Panama was like that wasn't the deal. They're like this is Panama, and they like no, this is the canal zone, and they set up all these like I love canal zones. Whoever decided to just fold it over on itself, whoever decided to a four and a half canal? You know what I love is that? Okay, so, like let's say you got the Pepperino, the cheese right, the canal thing pops up and then like the cheese melts into the other canal area and all of a sudden you got a raised up. Honestly, the science behind its incredible. Pretty it's a modern engine canal zones. So they said this is the canal zone, and what they did is they built this city just kind of all along the canal zone. Um, that was in America. Yeah, it was. They did this in the ninet twenties and it was what you'd see in the US. They built these schoolhouses, everybody there spoke English, they put up American flags and like it was the US right. And then just along this river, and Panama was like, Hey, this is a raw deal. We got here because they built this giant canal. Yeah, they're operating it, they're getting all the money from it, and the people who are traveling through it sometimes they'll stop, but they never go into Panama City or any outside of the canal zones. They're spending all our money and stuff where in the U s area, not where we benefit from it. So we're not benefiting from this at all. We literally cut US IN HALF and we're getting we've got nothing to show for it. Um, and they actually became like this big division of people who live in the canal zones with people who are out and it became like this big Um, just a big cultural in the canal zone. Yeah, it's kind of like, you know, Kansas City, Missouri and Johnson County. Yeah, the Canal Zone. Uh. And so it all kind of erupted in uh when the US sent common nineteen, yeah, eighty nine, common nine team, which is fitting because that was exactly a hundred years after France was born. Okay, so are wrong. I mean I guess. I think Taylor Swift is responsible for the paramount canal conflict. So the US sent ten thousand troops to just kind of occupy, uh, and it turned into this pretty long war. Um, that resulted in two thousand uh in January, first two thousand. The US was like fine, it's yours, Panama. Um. And so now they own the canal and they've done a bunch of stuff, like improvements and stuff to it. They've widened it, wid didn't it? Now you can fit fatter boats, you can turn your boat around, it won't get stuck. Um. That Suez. Uh. So Um. Yeah, it all began literally five years ago with a dream from a guy who had honestly no right dreaming about that. He was just like, oh my gosh, that'd be cool. It would be so cool. No need for it, just kind of like literally on the other side of the planet, like he never would go over there pull up a map. I want to. I kind of want to dream for a little bit. You know, two white guys of the PODCAST. Let's pull up and figure where we're going to conquer. Yeah, where can we? where? We can now plant my flag? You know what I'm talking about. Where can I? Yeah, can it now? The new TIKTOK series can now now? I don't know. I'm not interested down here. I'm interested in like the other part of the world. What if we I wonder if there's a spot in Missouri can we put a canal in Kansas City? Can we build a Kansas City Canal? Surely Is there a spot right here? That can't be too long. That's a lot. No, I ride that on my bike. That's not too long from Lake Wakamas to the river. Maybe right here and you gonna cut it all the way where to downtown. No, I'm saying like just right here in this a spot where we could buy a small plot of land and just dig a canal for the joke. Yeah, support of my patreon. So we can make canal to here. Mm Hmm, Yep, right here, wanted't it be so much faster if we could sail at thistle, because right now it's too sharp of a turn. We want to build it like what is it like? A yeah, Oh, yeah, that's the river. Yeah, that's just so stupid. What a dumb bit. Let's get out of this I'm looking at now. Yeah, there we go, keep going, keep going, keeps me. Okay, that's all right. Yeah, that's a good spot for a canal. That's interesting. So anyways. Yeah, that's uh, that's the Panama Panama Canal, crazy history. Um, my favorite part of the stamps. Yeah, I love the that's super passive aggressive. I enjoy that. Yeah, it's great. It worked. It worked. To think the Panama can now would never exist if it wasn't for some guy's stamp choice. Yeah, that's good, butterfly. Do you think if we put the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty next to each other, because they're both from France, right? Yeah, yeah, I think I think you could loop something around the torch and build a sling shot. Sling shot. Yeah, Oh, what would you sling? Well, what I sling then this Jick eatic sling shot. This feels like a weird, like street interview question. What would you sling if the Eiffel Tower and statue liberty would next to each other? But it's like a riddle for some reason and it's like I don't know anyway fiddle off. Things on the last night is a production of space tim media, produced by Christian Taylor. Audio is edited by alace Garnett, video by Connor Betts. Social media is run by Caleb Walker and graphic designed by Caleb Goldberg, our host, or Jarren Meyers and Tim Stone. Please follow us on social media at tilling podcast. THAT'S T I L O in podcast. Leave a review, comment, subscribe wherever you are. Thank you for listening to things on the last night.


There’s an interesting stretch of land in southern Panama known as the Isthmus of Panama. This unique land mass separates the Atlantic and Pacific oceans by just 51 miles of rocky terrain. Throughout history, people dreamed of a way to traverse this stretch of land by sea. Proposals for a canal through Panama date back to 1534, when it was proposed by Charles V. However, the project wasn’t realized for another 400 years when the Panama Canal finally opened on August 15, 1914. This is no ordinary canal, though. It was a feat of modern engineering that is tantalizing even today. To make it even more phenomenal, you won’t believe the star-studded list of people who had their hands in its history.

Things I Learned Last Night is an educational comedy podcast where best friends Jaron Myers and Tim Stone talk about random topics and have fun all along the way. If you like learning and laughing a lot while you do, you’ll love TILLN. Watch or listen to this episode right now!

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Sources

The Panama Canal – Wikipedia


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