Everyday millions of children attend the public schools and are educated on the history, ideology and philosophy that comprise the foundation of the American social fabric. Few Americans find it necessary to question what is being taught, trusting in the local and federal governments to provide an unbiased, comprehensive and sincere teaching instead. But what if the curriculum was subtly filled with distortions, fabrications and fallacies? He who controls the reigns of power defines valid history; he who controls the reigns of power defines the past. Would the generation of parents, already indoctrinated with the misleading teachings even be aware that their children were being lied to? What defines a fact? Is anything taught in a history book factual? What would it mean if the fundamental axioms of this society were deemed by the watchdogs of knowledge to be gilded, faulty and illusory? Three topics every adult American is familiar with and has been taught in primary school are pre-Columban geography, the voyages of Columbus, and Thanksgiving. These topics are crucial to us because they establish justification for colonization and eventual absorption of the New World and also explain our socio-political roots. When comparing a typical history book to academic research things donâ€™t add up. The American people are being lied to, being taught a fairytale version of history by means of a misleading curriculum with an agenda. Will we continue to accept the old teachings or go beyond in pursuit of truth?
Itâ€™s commonly accepted that before Columbus everyone thought the world was flat and that if you sailed to the horizon you would fall off the edge. Although the earliest maps in known human history depicted the Earth as a cylindrical drum or saucer as was the case with Anaximanderâ€™s astronomy in the 7th century BCE (Couprie), contemporaries soon discovered that the Earth was round and calculated its approximate circumference by the 4th century BCE, about 1900 years before Columbus sailed the ocean blue (Lerner). Anaximanderâ€™s pupil Pythagoras determined that the Moon was round by carefully observing the terminator (the line between the part of the Moon in light and the part of the Moon in the dark) as it followed its orbit (Diggins). Since the Moon was round, argued Pythagoras, the Earth must also be round (StarChild). Later Anaxagoras observed the shadows cast by the Earth on the Moon during a solar eclipse were round, confirming that what Pythagoras had conjectured (Stern, Fairbanks). Â In the 4th century BCE Aristotle brought together the seminal works of Anaximander, Thales (Anaximanderâ€™s teacher), Pythagoras, Anaxagoras, Democritus (a preeminent supporter of Anaxagorasâ€™ work) and other Greek minds and finally declared in On The Heavens that the Earth was a sphere (Fowler, Wilson).
The ideas of these men were not isolated and used to simply amuse themselves; they became hard fact, commonly accepted amongst the intellectual elite (Marotta). Many classical coins even depict figures on top of a globe, holding globes and spheroid objects including planets, stars and other astrological entities (Marotta). We can assume by early antiquity that the concept of the Earth being round was common (even to the typical peasant), otherwise representations such as these would not be printed on currency.
But knowing that the world was a round sphere was not enough for the ancient Greeks, they now yearned to know the exact size of the planet. In the 3rd century BCE Eratosthenes reconfirmed Aristotleâ€™s claim that the planet was a sphere and then also measured the circumference to be about 250,000 stadia or 46,250 kilometers (O’Connor). Modern calculations determine that the circumference of Earth is about 40,076.5 kilometers. Eratosthenes would go on to also measure the distance between Earth and the Moon and the sun and also made one of the first complete maps, including land from China to the British Isles. Posidonius and Aristarchus, following in Eratosthenesâ€™ footsteps, also came to the same conclusions (Stern). By the end of the 2nd century BCE the ancient Greeks had effectively achieved the same facts about our planetâ€™s geography that we hold true today (Lerner). The Arabs who soon replaced the Greek lords from Byzantium to India would only improve on classical findings and the spread of Hellenic knowledge. El Ma’mun, ruler of Baghdad during the 9th century CE used the same logic Eratosthenes had and also came up with an approximate circumference of the Earth (Stern). Both the Greek and Arab scientistâ€™s knowledge was known to the court of Queen Isabella of Spain, the monarch who would eventually fund the genocidal Columbus expedition (Lerner, Zinn 1-2).
The commonly accepted belief is that Columbus was an adventurous, light hearted and brave pioneer who sought to establish a trade route between Spain and India by a trans-Atlantic voyage to the west and inadvertently stumbled upon the New World, being dubbed its discoverer. Columbus was supposedly brave because he thought the world was flat and could fall off before he reached India. Here, just as with pre-Columban geograph, we run into serious discrepancies. By the 11th century CE the entire northern Atlantic was dominated by the Vikings, with large colonies in Greenland, Iceland and the British Isles. Newfoundland, less than a hundred miles off the coast of Greenland, was eventually also colonized by the Vikings at L’Anse aux Meadows on the north eastern side of the island (Hackett, Ashliman, Lee, Brown). It is entirely likely that other Viking settlements have yet to be uncovered in the New World, to which the Vikings dubbed Vinland or â€œwine land.â€ We can make this assumption because the Vikings speak of grapes and other lush vegetation that they discovered in more southerly locales. Some historians estimate that the Vikings may have reached the modern New York area but didnâ€™t likely create settlements there (Sheppard Software).
One thing is for sure: the Vikings did have a colony at L’Anse aux Meadows (North America) at least 400 years before Columbus came upon the New World (Hackett, Ashliman, Lee, Brown). The colony was established by Leif Erickson (the same strongman who founded the Greenland colonies) and was eventually abandoned. Unlike the more hospitable Indians to the south the Inuit and Beothuk or Skraelings as the Vikings called them (Lewis) native to the area were found to be extraordinarily malicious, were deadly fighters and frequently attacked the Viking colonists at L’Anse aux Meadows (Lee, CanadianHistory.com). These attacks proved to be too much for the Vikings to handle and they fled Newfoundland. Eventually the Greenland colonies were also abandoned, most likely also overrun by the Skraeling warriors (Lee, CanadianHistory.com). A map of Vinland discovered in the 1950s previously thought to be a forgery was in 2004 proven to be legitimate by Jacqueline Olin, of the Smithsonian Center for Materials Research and Education. The map carbon dated to 1434 CE clearly (and quite accurately) maps the entire north eastern Canadian coast, proving that Europeans had a good knowledge of the â€œNew Worldâ€ before Columbus was even born. On another note (related to the first argument) the mapâ€™s continents are distorted in conformance to the concept that the world was round as are modern maps.
Columbus was given two antiquated caravels and a carrack by Queen Isabella, ships far inferior to the popular galleons of the day that had a maximum operating range far less than would be enough to make a voyage to India (Stern). Columbus would have been given a galleon if he seriously wanted to reach India, a trans-Atlantic journey in a caravel or carrack would have been a literal suicide mission, with the ships food supplies running out far before even a third of the way to the destination. According to Lawrence S. Lerner, a professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at California State University in â€œPrentice Hall promotes a silly story as fact:â€
â€œColumbus’s plan for reaching Asia involved sailing westward at a latitude approximating the Tropic of Cancer (23.5 degrees North), to exploit the northeast trade winds. According to information that had been gained over many centuries, the eastward distance to the Asian coast, at that latitude, was about 8,000 miles; and according to Eratosthenes’s findings, the total distance around the world at that latitude was about 23,000 miles. So Columbus’s westward voyage would have to cover 15,000 miles (i.e., 23,000 minus 8,000), which was far beyond the range of the ships of the time. This could hardly inspire confidence in the people from whom Columbus would seek political and financial support.â€
Once Columbus arrived, it wasnâ€™t all fun and games as is depicted in history books; it was wanton destruction, genocide and gold collection. Examining the writings of Bartolome de las Casas as reported by Howard Zinn in Peopleâ€™s History of the United States, biographer of Columbusâ€™ son a different image emerges then the picturesque hero depicted in Prentice Hall. Columbus made four voyages to the New World. He soon discovered the Arawak Indians who lived in Haiti. Modern estimates suggest that between three and ten million Arawaks lived on the island when Columbus arrived (Two-Hawks). He immediately began to oppress the natives, using any form of resistance as a pretext for massive reprisals and brutal torture campaigns (Vivian). Columbus actively encouraged kidnapping, murdering, raping and terrorizing the natives as well as plundering to his men. On March 24 1495 Columbus stopped casually brutalizing the natives and actually led an invasion force to finally enslave the entire Arawak population, which he succeeded at. Columbus soon noticed that some Arawaks had gold necklaces or used gold dust to decorate ornaments, leading him to believe that Haiti was a goldmine waiting to be exploited (Vivian). Columbus lacked one commodity though: laborers. Columbus decided to use his new slave race to mine up the entire island in search of gold.
Those who resisted were immediately dismembered or murdered, usually having their hands cut off. According to Jim Vivian, respected independent researcher and author of â€œColumbus – No Hero to America:â€
â€œSeeking gold, he enslaved the remaining Arawaks to work the mines. Those who refused had their hands cut off. Conditions for the Arawak become so intolerable that as many as 100 at a time would commit suicide. Women were known to kill their newborn babies, rather than have them raised in such hideous circumstances. Columbus would reward his officers with women to rape. Girls 10 to 12 were especially desired for rape.â€
Once Columbus died his son Diego took over the governorship of Hispaniola and resumed the killing. Modern estimates suggest that were about 12,000 Arawaks in the region by 1516 CE (Vivian) and by the mid 17th century CE, the entire people had been made extinct. Today, no Arawak Indians exist. Columbus and his son had killed at least three million Arawaks and probably much more in a land already discovered for a justification dispelled by ancient Greek theory, rivaling a body count to the most universally defamed figure in history, Adolph Hitler. Our hero also established the concept of people as property. Although slavery existed before Columbus, the ancients knew that slaves were human beings and had feelings and desires. Columbus brought about the paradigm in which they were simply material objects to be casually brutalized and traded (Rodriguez-Salgado). Columbus was the proprietor of modern slavery and a genocidal tyrant.
Finally, we have Thanksgiving. The common belief is that the original Thanksgiving was the friendly and mutually beneficial meeting of Native Americans and the Pilgrims, that a great feast was had to celebrate surviving through a tough winter and that these two cultures synergized to create a long lasting and constructive alliance. Of course, as is common to all things in the official history book explanation, this is mostly false. According to the Independent Media Center and Laura Elliff, Vice President, Native American Student Association in â€œThe Thanksgiving Massacre:â€
â€œWilliam Newell, a Penobscot Indian and former chair of the anthropology department of the University of Connecticut, claims that the first Thanksgiving was not “a festive gathering of Indians and Pilgrims, but rather a celebration of the massacre of 700 Pequot men, women and children.” In 1637, the Pequot tribe of Connecticut gathered for the annual Green Corn Dance ceremony. Mercenaries of the English and Dutch attacked and surrounded the village; burning down everything and shooting whomever try to escape. The next day, Newell notes, the Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony declared: “A day of Thanksgiving, thanking God that they had eliminated over 700 men, women and children.” It was signed into law that, “This day forth shall be a day of celebration and thanksgiving for subduing the Pequots.” Most Americans believe Thanksgiving was this wonderful dinner and harvest celebration. The truth is the “Thanksgiving dinner” was invented both to instill a false pride in Americans and to cover up the massacre.â€
Newellâ€™s findings are uniformly supported by most serious historians who are not chained down by an agenda or the political ramifications of their research including Zinn, Johyn Westcott and Paul Apidaca. William Bradford would later toast the victory over the Pequots in History of the Plymouth Plantation:
“Those that scraped the fire were slaine with the sword; some hewed to peeces, others rune throw with their rapiers, so as they were quickly dispatchte, and very few escapted. It was conceived they thus destroyed about 400 at this time. It was a fearful sight to see them thus frying in the fyer, and the streams of blood quenching the same, and horrible was the stincke and sente there of, but the victory seemed a sweete sacrifice, and they gave the prayers thereof to God, who had wrought so wonderfully for them, thus to inclose their enemise in their hands, and give them so speedy a victory over so proud and insulting an enimie.”
The Puritans perceived the Indians as beings of Satan and frequently warred against the Pequots (Westcott, Two-Hawks, Campfire Story). By the 17th century the Pequot civilization, much like the Arawaks before them, was annihilated by American heroes (Two-Hawks). John Underhill, a captain of a pilgrim raider force that lead the massacre later wrote a book glorifying the attack, including a full illustration showing Dutch and English mercenaries surrounding and massacring the defenseless women, children and old men within (Elliff).
As we have discovered the founding history of the United States is filled with deceptions, falsities, fabrications and fallacies. We have only had the time to briefly overview three elements of the founding story, but a world more of lies awaits us in Prentice Hall propaganda. In the future we should strive to enforce the academic integrity of our school teachings so that we might as a people better embrace sincere living and ideology based on actual happenings instead of fabrications. The lies which riddle our school system is the lies which forever contribute to the numbing and blinding of our people, to be more bovine, ignorant and content to live in a world where truth takes the backseat to desire.
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