Why Do We Celebrate Columbus Day Anyway?

All around the great wide world,
Columbus sailed the ocean
To prove the world was big and round--
That's real devotion!

(--Sung to the tune of “Pop Goes the Weasel”, by unknown author)

For many people, commemorating the US holiday Columbus Day is a way of both honoring Christopher Columbus' achievements and celebrating Italian-American heritage. The facts surrounding Columbus' discovery of the New World over 500 years ago still spark controversy. 

Even one of the basic ideas that most of us learned in school—that Columbus wanted to prove that the world was not flat — is not true. Most educated Europeans did understand that the world was round; however, they were unaware of the existence of the Pacific Ocean, believing instead that the Atlantic was the only ocean between Europe and the East Indies. 

Here are a few bits of trivia about Columbus and Columbus Day:

• Records show that despite being sponsored by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, Columbus received no payment until 1493.
• Columbus was the captain of the Santa Maria. The captains of the Pinta and the Nina were the Pinzon Brothers. The youngest, Vicente Yáñez Pinzón, is considered by historians to have been the first to discover Brazil.
• Columbus Day is celebrated in Latin American countries as The Day of the Race (El Dia de la Raza), honoring the many different peoples of Latin America.

For more information, you can visit the History Channel and see what you can ‘discover.’