A poetic exploration of the construction of
the Panama Canal.
Silver People
Voices from the Panama Canal
by Margarita Engle
Fourteen-year-old Mateo and other Caribbean islanders face discrimination, segregation, and harsh working conditions when American recruiters lure them to the Panamanian rain forest in 1906 to build the great canal.
From the young "silver people" whose backbreaking labor built the Canal to the denizens of the endangered rain forest itself, this is the story of one of the largest and most difficult engineering projects ever undertaken...beautifully told through the voices of the workers in the form of
short poems.
