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Columbus
Day
In
fourteen hundred ninety-two
Columbus sailed the ocean blue.
As every
school child knows, Christopher
Columbus was the Italian navigator who sailed with Spanish
ships to a land inhabited by native
Americans only to mistakenly call them Indians
because he thought he had landed in India!
Despite
the confusion, the discovery changed the course of history.
Of many
celebrations that still mark the discovery of America, the
one in NYC is by far the grandest and most popular. This year,
it takes place on Monday, October 12, 2009 beginning at 11:45
AM as huge lunchtime crowds come out to cheer along
the parade route up Fifth Avenue from 44th Street north to
79th Street.
What's
closed on Columbus Day? Despite it being a normal workday
for many Americans, Columbus Day is an official federal government
holiday with the post office and banks closing in honor of
the day (although Wall St. stock markets still stay open as
usual.)
Today,
the American Indian is given equal time in many areas where
Indigenous
Peoples Day is celebrated. Who really discovered
America? Join the fray as we celebrate both traditional and
new ways to celebrate Columbus Day with stories and history
lessons, arts and crafts ideas, clip art and interactive exhibits.
More about Columbus Day around the Web:
Columbus
Day - From the Holiday Zone, with fun arts and crafts
ideas, songs and poems, with links to sites that celebrate
Columbus Day with clip art and other crafts. Sites that celebrate
Indigenous Peoples Day are given equal time, as well.
The
Pinta, Nina, and Santa Maria - Corpus Christi Texas
is the home of the replicas of these ships - donated to the
US on the 500th Anniversary of their first arrival here.
Christopher
Columbus and the Spanish Empire - The University of
Calgary does a good job of presenting the facts in The
European Voyages of Exploration.
The
Columbus Navigation Homepage - Columbus and his voyages
are the focus here. Methods of navigation, who really discovered
America, interaction with native cultures and other questions
about the tales of Columbus.
also
see in Art & Culture -> Native
American Art
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