ABSTRACT
The Florida peninsula and keys jut southward some four hundred miles from the main landmass of the United States, and the idea of cutting a canal across the peninsula's relatively narrow northern waist is not, on its face, implausible. At that point, from the Gulf of Mexico to easily navigable waters leading to the Atlantic is, as the crow flies, about 70 miles; furthermore, land elevations are in some places almost at sea level and nowhere are they more than a few hundred feet above it. But the north Florida peninsula is not one of those few places in the world, such as the Isthmus of Panama or the Isthmus of Suez, where, from a glance at the map, one can say a canal clearly must be built.
