The Longest Line on the Map: The United States, the Pan-American Highway, and the Quest to Link the Americas by Eric Rutkow

This was a very interesting topic, presented by a professor of history, with a very scholarly, and somewhat dry approach. The title was also somewhat deceptive, since getting to the Pan-American Highway itself took about 200 pages of back story. With these two factors against it, I could not rank it higher.

It started off with a bang, with a terrific introduction kicked off by a long quote from On the Road about driving into Mexico on the Pan-American Highway. How could I not be intrigued? And as one who loves road trips, and feels an affinity for Latin American cultures, I was also very interested.

Getting to the concept of a highway through the Americas was preceded by a good deal of history which centered on the development of railroads in the United States, Mexico, and the Central and South American countries. This is really a book in itself, and perhaps should have been the first of two volumes (or even three, with the middle one being the Panama Canal). As it was, I raced through it to get to the section which focused on the construction, such as it was, of the road.

There were some colorful characters along the way, and fascinating information about the effect United Fruit had on the Central American countries, good and bad. I was looking for more insights into the cultures and peoples of the regions, and how they were impacted, but there was not as much of this as I would have liked. History, in my opinion, is far more about people and concepts than about dollars and cents, though of course, knowing what the U.S. Congress appropriated for construction was interesting. The author should have added parentheticals to indicate what the amounts would be in current dollars to add context.

After reading the book, I had some conclusions that are relevant to today's economic, political and humanitarian crises centering on immigration. If the U.S. had pursued more thoughtful policies, and delivered further assistance and funding to the struggling countries in Central America and parts of South America, and more supportive trade agreements, I believe we would not be facing the issues we have today. We are directly and indirectly responsible for the drug trade, gang wars, political unrest and violence millions face in Central America and certain South American countries. With all of our might and power, we could have done a lot more good in the past, and should not be punishing people who come here now to escape some of what we created due to prejudice and shortsightedness.