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Show Stamp Helped Settle Panama Canal Site San Francisco. A Nicaraguan postage post-age stamp had a lot to do with the decision of the United States to build a canal across the Isthmus of Panama instead of through Nicaragua. The story Is told by Judge Francis Butler Loomis, assistant secretary of state under the late John Hay, who helped negotiate for American acquisition ac-quisition of the Canal Zone. There was a debate in the senate over the two routes, Loomis recalls, and advocates of Nicaragua appeared to be winning when some speaker protested pro-tested that volcanoes there would menace the big ditch. Champions of the Nicaragua route retorted that there were no volcanoes in that country. coun-try. A foe of the Nicaragua canal rose and exhibited a letter bearing a Nicaragua Nica-ragua postage stamp, portraying a volcano in eruption. It brought down the house, and was a factor in final approval of the isthmus route. |