Spanish views from a small town

I am ambivalent towards today's celebration. It's Columbus Day, known in Spain as the Fiesta Nacional or Día de la Hispanidad . At the beginning of the twentieth century it was also known as the Día de la Raza , or Race Day. It marks the discovery of America by Columbus as emissary of the Catholic Monarchs, and the beginning of the Spanish Empire. It's true that if Columbus hadn't "discovered" the New World, history would have been very different. There might not even have been the countries we know today in the American continents. The key is that Columbus was subscribed by the powerful Spanish monarchs. He was literally hired by the government of Spain to find land to colonize. It was a public expedition. Because Columbus wasn't the first to arrive. Leif Ericsson missed Greenland and ended up in Vinland, now thought to be Nova Scotia. Sir Henry Sinclair of Rosslyn fame is supposed to have visited what is now New England in the 1300's. There is rea...