Count Ferdinand de Lesseps
Wikipedia writes:
Ferdinand Marie, Vicomte de Lesseps
GCSI; 19 November 1805 to 7 December
1894) was a French diplomat and
later developer of the Suez Canal,
which in 1869 joined the
Mediterranean and Red Seas,
substantially reducing sailing
distances and times between Europe
and East Asia.
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, as well as beset by financial
problems, and the planned de Lesseps
Panama Canal was never completed.
Eventually, the project was bought
out by the United States who changed
the design to a non-sea-level canal
with locks, which was completed in
1914.
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