Christopher Columbus and whose land is it anyway?

 My friend Colin in his blog has been going on a little about Christopher Columbus and the question of where he was buried and, more controversially, where he was born. He likes to think that Cristobal Colón, as the Spaniards call him, was born in Poio, Pontevedra, Galicia. 

Coincidentally, my Italian friend and teacher and leader of our zoom Italian conversation class on Monday was getting equally worked up, as only Sicilians can, about the nationality of Christopher Columbus (Cristoforo Colombo, as the Italians call him), declaring him to be most definitely Italian. How dare anyone suggest otherwise? She says she tries to ignore the news, steadfastly not reading newspapers, as she finds it all too depressing. But her English/Scots husband had pushed a Guardian article about good old CC her way. Hence the indignation. She then ranted for a while about Christopher Columbus day in the USA and told us that really Columbus should have been shot before he was able to “discover” America and inflict US hegemony on the world.  Wow! 

Apparently the second Monday of October marks Indigenous Peoples Day and Columbus Day in the United States. It all gets a little confusing. In 2022, President Joe Biden issued a proclamation:

     “NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR., President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim October 10, 2022, as Indigenous Peoples’ Day.  I call upon the people of the United States to observe this day with appropriate ceremonies and activities.  I also direct that the flag of the United States be displayed on all public buildings on the appointed day in honor of our diverse history and the Indigenous peoples who contribute to shaping this Nation.”

They do seem to like a bit of flag waving.

So now there is Indigenous People’s day, as there should be, and more and more states are starting to embrace that idea but Columbus Day is still commemorated as such in quite a few states.

 Doing a bit of research, I found that the direct reason for declaring the anniversary of Columbus’s arrival a national holiday was the mass lynching of 11 Italian Americans in New Orleans in 1891. The New Orleans police chief had been murdered and the city’s Italian population was blamed.  19 Italians were to be tried but weak evidence led to 6 being acquitted and 3 trials were declared mistrials. Before the rest could be tried an angry mob stormed the prison and shot 11 Italians, some of whom were not even on trial. That’s angry mobs for you! 

The event threatened diplomatic relations between Italy and the United States, and, to appease the Italian government, U.S. President Benjamin Harris proclaimed the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s arrival a national holiday in 1892, intending it to be a one-time celebration.

But cities with a large Italian-American population began to celebrate it every year and in 1937 it was proclaimed an annual federal holiday, with parades and floats and general jollity. However by 1992 (500 years on from Columbus sailing the ocean blue) some people had started objecting to celebrating it and proposed alternatives, such as Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Small compensation really for having your land taken over! 

Thinking of such matters, here’s a poem by Michael Rosen:

PROMISED LAND

A family arrived and said they had papers

To prove that his house was theirs.

• No, no, said the man, my people have always lived here,

My father, grandfather …. and look the garden,

My great-grandfather planted that.

• No, no, said the family, look at the documents.

There was a stack of them.

• Where do I start? said the man.
• No need to read the beginning, they said,

Turn to he page marked ‘Promised Land’.

• Are they legal? he said, who wrote them?
• God, they said, God wrote them, look,

Here come his tanks. 

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!