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History
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Founded in 1852 on filled-in mangrove swamps as the Caribbean terminal of the transisthmian railway, ColA?n was originally named Aspinwall after one of the railway's owners. The Colombian authorities' insistence that it be called ColA?n, after Christopher Columbus, led to a long-running dispute that only ended because letters from the US addressed to Aspinwall never reached their destination. The railway brought many immigrants and a degree of prosperity to the town, and though it slipped into decline in 1869 when the completion of the transcontinental railway in the US reduced traffic across the isthmus, its fortunes revived with the initiation of the French canal construction in 1879. The French founded the neighbouring port enclave of Cristobal, and vast quantities of men and material flowed through ColA?n, but it remained a poverty- and disease-ridden slum town famed for its depravity. Burned to the ground during an 1885 uprising led by
Pedro Prestan
, a Haitian later hanged in front of huge crowds on
Front Street
, the city was rebuilt by the French and prospered again during the US canal construction effort. ColA?n's heyday came in the 1950s, when it was among the most fashionable cruise destinations in the Caribbean, but despite its role as PanamA?'s main port and the success of the Free Zone (founded in 1949), the city slipped into gradual decline and the cruise ships stopped coming. Although the port and Free Zone continue to thrive, little of the money they generate stays in ColA?n, and many of the employees are bussed in from PanamA? City. In the face of urban poverty as extreme as any in Latin America and unemployment levels approaching fifty percent, it is little surprise that many have turned to
crime
, particularly drug trafficking, as a way to survive. The most recent attempt to reverse the city's interminable decline is centred on reviving ColA?n as a destination for cruise ships, but even if successful the idea that this will transform the city's prospects seems a forlorn hope. Other useful information
for tourists (each section contains more specific sub-sections): |
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Panama,
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