Columbus Holiday

The myth of Christopher Columbus is quite scary considering the fact that we practically praise him as a hero and a great man for "finding the United States". Columbus was not a nice man and many things about him turned up about him later in his life. The question is then, why do we have a holiday and numerous cities named after him. First of all, the holiday was instituted in 1937, and while I don't believe he deserves all of the praise that many textbooks commonly give him, he deserves a little. Columbus had described and recorded his journeys very precise and therefore other European explorers were not as afraid to come out and explore the rest of the unknown lands. Columbus opened the door to exploration in the Americas and also a western sea route to the east was discovered partly because of him. The reason we have a holiday for him is because of plain ignorance. Not many people will complain when they are getting a long weekend for some guy who discovered their country. Thats about as most Americans will go in discussing Christopher Columbus and everybody seems to forget that he disrupted a society on the DR/Hati and led them to a complete eradication only to bring back slaves but yet ruin a whole societies way of life and families.