The Diplomat
The Ambassador of Panama, Allen Sellers Lara, presented last Thursday at Casa América the conference entitled From Galicia to Panama: the Galicians in the construction of the interoceanic canal, which was given by the Panamanian Ricardo Gago, president of the Fundación Nosa Terra.
In a Miguel de Cervantes hall at the cultural headquarters in Madrid’s Plaza de Cibeles packed with Panamanian citizens, Ambassador Allen Sellers thanked the Nosa Terra Foundation for its “academic rigour” in researching and compiling historical data on those years and circumstances.
“The history of our two countries, the Panamanian ambassador pointed out, is still being constructed right now on both sides of the Atlantic. I would like to say to the students, to the scientists, to the Spanish investors who today want to make their way to Panama, which has recently been designated as one of the best places to settle. Likewise, the people who come from there, from Panama, the agricultural producers, the sellers, the students who also come to Spain to build a future for themselves and to build that history”.
Ricardo Gago then took the floor, detailing in detail and with data the number of Galicians who went to work on the construction of the Canal and who caused admiration in the US authorities for their “resistance, perseverance and docility when it came to work”. Unfortunately, this also translated into almost slave-like working conditions for men who had fled Spain in search of a decent future given the social misery experienced during the reign of Alfonso XIII.
Spanish workers were the second largest contingent recruited by US agents to build the Panama Canal (1904-1914), which allowed for the inter-oceanic link. Of these Spaniards, three out of four were Galicians.
The official figures of the Isthmian Canal Commission indicate that 8,298 Spaniards were recruited for this great work, most of whom worked as labourers on the railways and, above all, as pick-and-shovel workers. However, preliminary results of new research funded by the Nosa Terra Foundation show a higher number of Spanish workers, in addition to those who arrived illegally by their own means, following the Spanish government’s ban on emigration to Panama in 1908, and other clandestine immigrants.
The Nosa Terra Foundation seeks to actively publicise Galicia’s participation in the construction of the canal, as well as its many and varied contributions to Panama over the years. The Foundation is currently working on the publication of a book, a digital archive and the construction of a sculptural monument dedicated to the thousands of Galicians who gave their heart, life and soul to build the Panama Canal.
