Colón

關於Colón

Colón is a city and seaport in Panama, beside the Caribbean Sea, lying near the Atlantic entrance to the Panama Canal. It is the capital of Panama's Colón Province and has traditionally been known as Panama's second city. City proper located entirely on Manzanillo Peninsula (former island), surrounded by Limon Bay, Manzanillo Bay, and the Folks River. Since the disestablishment of the Panama Canal Zone, suburban corregimiento of Cristobal to include Fort Gulick, a former U.S. Army base, as well as the towns of Cristobal and Margarita; and recent corregimiento of Cristóbal Este now include the town of Coco Solo.

The city was founded in 1850 as the Atlantic terminal of the Panama Railroad, then underwent construction to meet the demand during the California Gold Rush for a fast route to California. For a number of years early in its history, the sizable United States émigré community called the town Aspinwall after Panama Railroad promoter William Henry Aspinwall, while the city's Hispanic community called it Colón in honor of Christopher Columbus. The city was founded on the western end of a treacherously marshy islet known as Manzanillo...

Overview adapted from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA. Photography via Wikimedia Commons.