A portrait of an elderly Ferdinand de Lesseps

His memory is linked to two immense 19th-century projects. The first was the successful construction of the Suez Canal, a major technical and economic feat. The second, by contrast, was a long and resounding fiasco, leading to delays, bankruptcies and corruption scandals involving numerous personalities: the construction of the canal linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans in Panama. This ill-conceived project cost shareholders so much money that the promoter was sentenced to five years in prison, a sentence he did not serve due to his advanced age (88).