On This Day

On this day in 1977, a treaty guaranteeing that Panama would gain control of the Panama Canal after 1999, was signed by President Jimmy Carter and General Omar Torrijos, ending U.S. control.

The Panama Canal officially opened on August 15, 1914. Completed at a cost of more than $350 million, it was the most expensive construction project in U.S. history to that point. Altogether, some 3.4 million cubic meters of concrete went into building the locks, and nearly 240 million cubic yards of rock and dirt were excavated during the American construction phase.