Christopher Columbus in United States Historiography: Biography as Projection

FOR HISTORICAL SCHOLARSHIP, 1992 represents an important anniversary-the quincentenary of the first voyage of Christopher Columbus from Spain to the Western Hemisphere. Columbus has long occupied an important position in the cultural tradition of the United States. Although he never saw the mainland of North America, one of the holidays in the national calendar commemorates his first landfall in the western hemisphere. Columbus Day originated as an Italian-American holiday, however, and continues to be identified more with Italy than with the voyage sponsored by Spain. At least forty-seven counties, cities, and towns in the United States, scattered among twenty-nine of the fifty states, are named for Columbus, along with numerous civic and cultural institutions. The placenames usually take the form of Columbus or Columbia, but they also include other variations, such as Columbiana in Alabama and Ohio, and Colon in Michigan.' The federal government of the United States has its seat in the District of Columbia, and the goddess "Columbia," a poetic invention of the late nineteenth century, was designed as a symbol of the United States.