October 10 - With a Push of a Button, Two Oceans are Joined

Labor History in 2:00 · Oct 10, 2026 · 1m

On this day in Labor History the year was 1913. At 2:02 in the afternoon President Woodrow Wilson at the White House touched of an explosion at the Gamboa Dike in Panama. With that touch of a button the last barrier to joining the waters of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans through the Panama Canal went up in smoke.

The Chicago Tribune described the scene in Panama, “Then suddenly came the muffled roar of the discharge of 1,600 pounds of dynamite, which sent a shower of water, mud, and rock high into the air, spreading out as it went upward, the whole heavily veiled in a cloud of smoke...As…