also opened and ran a pharmacy near the hospital on Avenue B. It is probable his first wife died, as on 6 February 1872, Amador married Manuela María Maximiliano de la Ossa Escobar. With de la Ossa, Amador had two children, Raúl Arturo, who as an adult was attached to the Panamanian consulate in New York City and Elmira María, who married William Ehrman, one of the owners of the Ehrman Banking Company. Return to politics "Amador Hermanos" brought in brother, José Amador, and began working with the French company building the Panama Canal in 1879. Simultaneously, Manuel continued his work as a doctor for the Panama Canal Railway and Hospital Santo Tomás. In 1886, during the period when Colombia was reorganizing its sovereign states under a federal government, Amador served as the last President of the Sovereign State of Panamá, taking over the post vacated by on 5 June 1886 and serving until 5 August 1886. During this time frame, Amador served as chairman of the Council of the District of Panama, which had to vote on approval of the Colombian Constitution of 1886. At the end of 1888, the French company which was digging the canal went bankrupt, causing the failure of the Amador brothers' business. José Amador died soon after the business closed, but Manuel covered the company's losses. Amador favored continuing the canal project and when Lucien Bonaparte-Wyse made the journey to Bogotá in 1890 to gain a concession for a ten-year extension, he was accompanied by Amador. Instability plagued the French project and then in 1900, the Thousand Days' War erupted between Colombian political factions. The government in Bogotá asked the United States to protect the railway in Panama, causing the US Marines to intervene on the isthmus. In exchange for keeping the vital transit open, President José Manuel Marroquín pledged that he would insure that the United States would receive authorization to complete the canal upon restoration of peace. Amador wrote to President Marroquín, who was a personal friend, urging the approval of the Hay–Herrán Treaty. Rather than appointing a favorable candidate, Marroquín appointed an opponent to the ratification, Juan Bautista Pérez y Soto as Panama's congressman during the negotiations. Independence movement The appointment caused José Agustín Arango to recruit his sons, Belisario, José Agustín and Ricardo Manuel; his son-in-laws Ernesto Tisdel Lefevre, Samuel Lewis, and Raoul Orillac; and a friend, Carlos Constantino Arosemena