Aspinwall

Aspinwall, or COLON, a town in Colombia, virtually, however, a colony of the United States. It is situated at the Atlantic extremity of the Panama Railway (1849-55), and of what was to have been the Panama Canal (see PANAMA), on the island of Manzanilla in Limon Bay, 8 miles NE. of the old Spanish port of Chagres, 47 NW. of Panama by rail, and equidistant from the great trading capitals of Valparaiso and San Francisco. Pop. about 1500, mostly blacks. From its commanding position as a place of transit, Aspinwall benefits by the traffic in both directions. The climate, formerly very unhealthy, has been greatly improved by drainage. In 1870 the Empress Eugénie presented the town with a statue of Columbus, after whom it is named officially Colon. The name Aspinwall it derives from a New York merchant, the originator of the Panama Railway; the company having founded the town in 1850. It was burned by insurgents in 1885.