The management of esophageal cancer has been evolving over the past 30 years. In the United States, multimodality treatment combining chemotherapy and radiotherapy (RT) prior to surgical resection has come to be accepted by many as the standard of care, although debate about its overall effect on survival still exists, and rightfully so. Despite recent improvements in detection and treatment, the overall survival of patients with esophageal cancer remains lower than most solid tumors, which highlights why further advances are so desperately needed. The aim of this article is to provide a complete review of the history of esophageal cancer treatment with the addition of chemotherapy, RT, and more recently, targeted agents to the surgical management of resectable disease.