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Historian David McCullough perhaps is best known for his 1993 Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of U.S. President Harry Truman and as the host of the PBS series "The American Experience." Among his early successes was his account of the building of the Panama Canal, "The Path Between the Seas," which won the 1978 National Book Award and several other honors, and is still in paperback (Simon & Schuster, $18). McCullough has passed through the canal more times than he can remember, and says he looks forward to making the trip again. McCullough recently discussed his perspectives on the canal with CNN Interactive World Editor Terry Goggin.

Miraflores and Pedro Miguel locks lower Pacific-bound ships to sea level in three steps

CNN: What is the Panama Canal?

McCullough: The Panama Canal is not, as many people imagine, just a big ditch through the Isthmus of Panama in the way the Suez Canal is. The Panama Canal is a very complicated, ingenious engineering contrivance that lifts [ships] through the power of water -- through hydraulics, locks, lock gates -- up to a lake nearly 80 feet above sea level, and then the ships sail over the lake and then are let down on the other side by another system of locks. So it's really a bridge over the isthmus as much as a trench through the isthmus -- a bridge of water... And that's its brilliance...

CNN: How did the building of the canal nearly 100 years ago compare with America's great national space effort of the 1960s, namely the Apollo Project?

NARRATIVE   • Strategic: A century's journey in Panama   • History: Troubled passageway   • Operations: Transfer heavy on symbolism, light on change   • Politics: Canal return a mixed blessing?   • Interview: Historian David McCullough   • Security: Colombia boils

McCullough: This was the moon shot of its day. This was the greatest undertaking this country [had] ever attempted, and beyond its own borders. Everything [was] 2,000 miles from the base of supplies, including the personnel, the workforce, all of whom were brought to the scene. Every steam shovel, every paper clip, every nurse, engineer, secretary, doctor, every stick of dynamite, every rail track needed -- all of that was brought from very distant points to one of the most difficult and inhospitable climates on Earth. And the size, the magnitude of the undertaking surpassed anything in prior experience for any country in the world. And it ranks today, without any question, as one of the greatest achievements in American history.

... The workers came from many places, primarily from the West Indies. But over the years virtually every country in the world was represented by somebody on the workforce. So in a way, it's really a tremendous achievement, a symbol of affirmation for all of humankind.

Women as well as men worked on the canal, and [there was] of course the loss of life, particularly in the time of the French effort, which was in the last part of the 19th century. But again in the American time too, as it's called, the loss of life was formidable, and therefore the canal stands as a great monument to the courage and sacrifice of those people. More than 25,000 human beings died, at the least, in building the canal.

Workers stand on a steam shovel during work on Culebra Cut in September 1913. Culebra Cut later was renamed for Maj. David DuBose Gaillard, who oversaw its construction.

... The great breakthrough was in the discovery of the causes of malaria and yellow fever. Of those who died, most of them, approximately 20,000, succumbed to malaria or yellow fever during the French effort. And at that time it wasn't known that the two diseases were caused by two very different mosquitoes.

But by the time the Americans went in, the knowledge was available and we succeeded in eradicating yellow fever and virtually eradicating malaria from the Canal Zone, from the area where the work was taking place. And it was not just a great breakthrough on the effort for the canal and for Panama, but for all of the populations in tropical countries everywhere in the world, because malaria was the No. 1 killer. It hasn't been by any means eradicated, but it's certainly been vastly reduced.

CNN: Given the world's current political and economic climate, could such a project be attempted today?:

McCullough: Oh, I think so, certainly. If someone wanted to build a canal through Nicaragua, the Nicaraguans would be very happy about that. I don't think there's any question about that. For a long time there was a good deal of thought of doing it. [But] the cost would be overwhelming. It would take the financial wherewithal of an entire country to do it. It couldn't be done with private capital, I don't believe. If it were to be done in Panama again, you really couldn't build it much faster than it was originally, because you'd still have to use essentially the same technique, which is to haul the spoil -- the dirt that's dug away -- by railroad, virtually the same system. The overwhelming obstacle in Panama is its waters, its rains -- torrential rains -- and consequently the mud, and the particular geology of Panama, which gives rise to continuing landslides and mudslides.

CNN: What is the canal's place in history as the 20th century draws to a close?

Miraflores Locks, completed in 1913 and in good shape even after 86 years, exemplify the legacy of "a very difficult job, a very brave, noble undertaking done superbly," McCullough says

McCullough: It says a lot about the century and this country at the very start of this century. It was... our first great effort beyond our borders. America was stepping out into the world, and under the leadership of a president -- Theodore Roosevelt -- who insisted to the country and the world that whether we liked it or not, we had to play a major part in the world. And that's really been part of the growing pains of our nation in the century, and of course we have suffered a great deal in the loss of treasure and American lives as a consequence. But we really had no choice. It was the last constructive effort before the world changed with the war of 1914. The 20th century, it can be argued, really begins and the 19th century really ends with World War I, which as [historian] Barbara Tuchman says is like a burnt path across history.

The canal was an example of what large federal investment could do in the way of big engineering projects such as dams and locks, and it's the beginning of the pouring of federal concrete. Hoover Dam, all the great dams of the West... have their origins in the effort at Panama.

It's also, of course, an artery of world maritime trade second to none. And it has been working since 1914, virtually without a problem, [with] the same equipment, the same locks, the same [mechanisms] to operate the locks as were installed in 1914. This is a superb example of a very difficult job, a very brave, noble undertaking done superbly.