Monday, October 12 is Columbus Day. We remember this day to pay tribute to the 1st journey to America in 1492 by Christopher Columbus.

Saying that Columbus “discovered” America is no longer accepted as true. All the areas he visited in the “new” continent had people living in them.
Anyway, nearly 300 years after the “New World” became known, the Colombian Order marked the “first landing” with a service. Italian residents in New York and San Francisco took up the cue and prepared services. In 1892 President Benjamin Harrison, acknowledged the “discovery” in a statement. From 1920 Columbus Day is being observed annually. President Franklin Roosevelt in 1937 declared October 12 as ‘Columbus Day’. The Congress made the second Monday of October a national holiday in 1971.

Now we are getting to see Columbus as a fuller person. “Columbus is considered a legend by most people,” Eiden said. “But that’s just a one-sided version.” He added that Columbus’s significance as an explorer cannot be overlooked. But portraying him as a noble, full-length hero…no way!
Eiden has a point.

In places where there are native populations (Alaska) parents object to Columbus being described in textbooks as the “founder” of America.
In other places parents find it wrong that natives are referred to in demeaning terms. “Is this what we want to tell the kids about human rights and respect for different communities?” they ask. Another sore point is there is no mention of the diseases Columbus’s “exchange” programs brought to native Americans. Small pox, for example.
Teachers are striving to present a more balanced picture now. Schools like Eiden’s no longer observe a holiday in Columbus’s honour. Teachers are also talking about how the native populations of America suffered because of Columbus’s incursion. How he was mean [“bossy,” Eiden said], how he often didn’t know where he was.
Showing Columbus as wading inshore to a waiting welcome by a smiling group is misrepresentation, they say.
What we need are textbooks that give a balanced account of the explorer’s heroism as well as the consequences of his landing.