Who Discovered America?
On August 3, 1492, the Italian Explorer Christopher Columbus, financed by the Spanish King and Queen, Ferdinanad 11 of Aragon and Isabella of Castile, sailed from the Port of Palos in Spain, captaining a fleet of three caravelles — the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria.
Columbus, believing the age-old theories about the earth being round, embarked on the voyage to try and find a new sea route to India. He was convinced that he would reach the legendary Orient by travelling east.
On October 11 1942, after two months of exhausting navigation, he reached dry land-not of mythical Asia but a new continent-Hispanic America, or the Caribbean as we know it today.
In his first expedition Columbus discovered and explored the Guanahani Islands (afterwards re-named San Salvador in the Bahamas) Cuba and Haiti.