Happy Columbus Day?

In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue: Here's the course he sailed on a misadventure that took him to the Caribbean when he thought he had landed in India. But, in typical Eurocentric fashion, he named the natives he met there "Indians" anyway and the rest, alas, is HIStory.

Americans have been celebrating an annual Christopher Columbus holiday for centuries. In 1971, the U.S. Congress declared the second Monday in October a federal holiday in honour of this sea-faring Italian. And, many countries throughout the Americas and the Caribbean mark similar holidays in his name.

But click here and here for 1-page accounts that put this holiday into historically and politically correct perspective.



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