Ferdinand De Lesseps
Ferdinand Marie, Vicomte de Lesseps (19 November 1805 – 7 December 1894) was the French developer of the Suez Canal, which joined the Mediterranean and Red Seas in 1869, and substantially reduced sailing distances and times between the West and the East.
He attempted to repeat this success with an effort to build a Panama Canal at sea-level during the 1880s, but the project was devastated by epidemics of malaria and yellow fever in the area, and the projected de Lesseps Panama Canal was left uncompleted. It was eventually partially superseded by a non-sea-level canal with locks, built by the United States and completed in 1914.
Read more about Ferdinand De Lesseps: Early Years, Second Marriage and Issue, Statue of Liberty, Death, After His Death, Ancestry
Famous quotes containing the words ferdinand de and/or ferdinand:
“Ferdinand De Soto, sleeping
In the river, never heard
Four-and-twenty Spanish hooves
Fling off their iron and cut the green,
Leaving circles new and clean
While overhead the wing-tips whirred.”
—Mark Van Doren (1894–1973)
“I fairly confess that, acting as nature and simplicity dictated, no sooner did I see the once loved bosom of my Ferdinand free from those deformed demons which had crept in and filled up the vacant space, than beholding my natural home once more the seat of innocence and truth, my heart joyfully danced into its delightful abode.”
—Sarah Fielding (1710–1768)