“ALL of Colon was part of the Panama Canal Zone. As you get into the 1945 era, there are parts of the area that were went from military-use to canal-use, and eventually flipped over to the Panama gov’t.”
You are mistaken. The Republic of Panama had the Colon Corridor running through the Canal Zone and connecting their sovereign territory Colon to the rest of the Republic of Panama. This corridor ran along the southern perimeter of the U.S. Navy Coco Solo South installation. A piece of the Reservation Line can be seen in the following map:
http://panamaliving.com/CSmap2.jpg
The Colon Hospital was located on the northern shore of the City of Colon in the sovereign territory of the Republic of Panama. See the confirmation in the postcards dating from those years.
http://www.coloncity.com/colonhospital.html
Also see the Panama Canal Treaty Map depicting the Colon Corridor.
http://members.tripod.com/william_h_ormsbee/treaty_trans_summ_mil_p01.htm
This is a map of the Panama Canal Treat affected area per the 1903 agreement:
http://qalabist.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/panama-canal-1.jpg
There is one small area at the top edge of the Poco Solo peninsula which stayed within Panama authority. The rest, by the 1903 treaty was US sovereign territory (as deemed by the Hay-Banau-Varilla Treaty of 1903).
By signing Article III of the treaty, the entire Canal Zone was US sovereign territory, and was to be treated as such. Treaties that came later...undid portions of Article III, but all of these came after 1945. By the discretion of Panama, the US had all rights, power, and authority over the Canal Zone area.
The map on the Colon corridor doesn’t help because it’s related to the 1970s upgraded treaty and not the 1903 treaty.
As for the location of the pre-1941 Colon hospital and the 1941 concrete and upgraded hospital...I’ve never seen the pre-1941 location given.
The one curious piece of the Colon hospital is that it’s actually connected to an executive order (8981, given by FDR). See: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=60931
FDR identifies the site as not only a Naval site, but also a Canal Zone site. Course, this only settles hospital number II....not the original hospital.
