Will Columbus Day change anytime soon?

I guess we won’t be changing any Columbus Day celebrations, even though it’s pretty clear that the Vikings were on North America first. Vinland was located where Canada’s Newfoundland is today……

July 2009 article http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE56G58320090717 or http://tinyurl.com/n73ceu

Hi-Res Map: http://www.bnl.gov/bnlweb/pubaf/pr/photos/2002/vinland.jpg or http://tinyurl.com/yj5lhre

This map was carbon-dated to be circa 1440 -- 52 years before Columbus first landed in San Salvador.


Compare it to a Google Maps’ Mercator projection (which distorts polar land masses such as Greenland):

Google Maplink: http://tinyurl.com/yglh5eu

Found in 1898, the Kensington (Minnesota) Runestone bears the date 1362 (130 years before Columbus). It was found over 3,000 miles west of Newfoundland, but only 200 miles from Duluth MN at the western tip of Lake Superior.

Here's a recent (October 2009) article about it: http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/136096/group/Local%20News/

Modern day researchers think the Kensington Runestone was actually a land claim; the runes are similar to those carved on medieval tombstones by Cistercian monks of the Swedish island of Gotland (over 6,400 miles from Kensington).

This 6-minute video (March 2009) is by scientists who have been examining and dating the runestone: http://www.newsnet14.com/2009/03/30/proof-that-the-vikings-were-here-first/

For modern day adventure seekers, there’s even a possible tie-in to the Knights Templar, whose persecution had begun 30+ years prior to the Kensington MN Runestone land claim.