In 1879, the Congrès International d'Etudes du Canal Interocéanique (International Congress for Study of an Interoceanic Canal) was convened in Paris under the auspices of the Société de Géographie de Paris to consider proposals to build a canal across Central America, from the Caribbean Sea to the Pacific Ocean. Ferdinand de Lesseps, the French ex-diplomat who had spawned and led the company that created the Suez Canal, chaired the conference and dominated the discussions and the decision making. Despite an immense amount of evidence against the success of a sea-level canal across the Isthmus of Panama, de Lesseps' vision prevailed. More than 22,000 lives were lost and thousands of investors were out the equivalent of nearly $6 billion in current dollars when that Panama canal venture finally collapsed in 1889. Why was it that the errant views of one Frenchman won out over the combined wisdom of the engineering community, the financial community and many others who had spent time scouting the terrain and who had identified the huge problems of disease, torrential rain, dense rain forest, raging rivers and mountains that stood in the way of success? Why in this striking case did not the underlying wisdom of the group prevail?