American culture perpetuates the image of Columbus boldly forging ahead
while everyone else imagined the world was flat. A character in the movie
Star Trek V, for instance, repeats the Washington Irving lie: “The people of
your world once believed the earth to be flat; Columbus proved it was round.”
Every October, Madison Avenue makes use of the flat-earth theme. This ad
seeks clients for daring and courageous stockbrokers! With images like these in
our culture, history textbooks need to disabuse students of the flat-earth myth.
Even the death of Columbus has been changed to make a better story. Having
Columbus come to a tragic end—sick, poor, and ignorant of his great
accomplishment—adds melodramatic interest. “Columbus’s discoveries were
not immediately appreciated by the Spanish government,” according to The
American Adventure. “He died in neglect in 1506.” “He finally reaped only
misfortune and disgrace,” conclude Boorstin and Kelley. They add that he
“died still believing that he had sailed to the coast of Asia.” In fact, Spain