Panama Fever follows the long, hard road from dream to reality that finally ended in the completion of one of the greatest engineering feats in human history. Beginning in 1870, the Panama Canal was the costliest undertaking in history. Its completion in 1914 marked the beginning of the “American Century.” But it cost more than just blood and sweat. The canal proved the costliest project ever attempted in human history. The number of lives sacrificed to the completion of the Panama Canal is simply staggering. The most conservative estimates put the death toll at roughly 500 souls claimed for every mile of canal that was dug. Panama Fever is a fitting tribute to the great waterway that ushered in the American century. Crafting a tale of exploration, conquest, power, and science, Matthew Parker brings the canal and its extraordinary cast of characters to vivid life. Politicians engaged in high-stakes diplomacy in order to influence its construction. Meanwhile, engineers and workers from around the world rushed to take advantage of high wages and the chance to be a part of history. What impresses now about the story of the canal is not just the extraordinary number of ‘firsts’ its achievement entailed—financial, technical, and medical—but the astonishing, almost arrogant ambition of it all. Panama Fever is an epic history that shows how a small, fiercely contested strip of land made the world a smaller place and launched the era of American global dominance.