November 17, 1869: The Suez Canal opens in Egypt, providing a maritime route from Port Said on the Mediterranean Sea to Suez on the Red Sea, and cutting down ship time between Europe and Asia.
The Canal, 90 miles east of the national capital of Cairo, took 10 years to build. It runs 120 miles, and separates the Sinai Peninsula from the rest of Egypt -- and, though not officially, separates Egypt in Africa from Asia.
No longer would ships from Europe have to travel all the way around Africa to reach the Middle East, India, the Far East, and Australia. That same year, the transcontinental railroad opened in America. No longer would travelers have to board ships steaming all the way around South America to get from America's Atlantic Coast to its Pacific Coast. In 1870, a rail line connected the Indian cities of Calcutta and Bombay (now known as Kolkata and Mumbai).
A magazine article suggested that, with these 3 advances, it would now be possible to go around the world in 80 days -- less than 3 months, also less than 12 weeks. It led Jules Verne to write Around the World in 80 Days.
The canal is operated and maintained by the state-owned Suez Canal Authority (SCA) of Egypt. Under the Convention of Constantinople (1888), it may be used "in time of war as in time of peace, by every vessel of commerce or of war, without distinction of flag."
The canal was the property of the Egyptian government, but European shareholders, mostly British and French, owned the concessionary company which operated it until July 1956, when President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized it, an event which led to the Suez Crisis of the Autumn of 1956. Egypt closed the Canal at the beginning of the Six-Day War on June 5, 1967, reopening 8 years later, on June 5, 1975.
*
November 17, 1869 was a Friday. Baseball season was over. American football had just begun. Basketball had not yet been invented, and hockey barely had. So there were no scores on this historic day.
No comments:
Post a Comment