"Where am I?"
The question which every explorer asks himself surely puzzled that first European — was he Spaniard, Portuguese or English? — as he peered intently at the mysterious mainland of Mundus Novus, the New World.
Equally curious Indian eyes must have gazed back from a Florida mangrove thicket, wondering at the huge canoes with white wings that glided on jade waters beyond the breakers.
Two vastly different cultures prepared to meet. It was to be a turning point in the affairs of men that each side undoubtedly sensed.
In time, both explorers and natives found generally violent answers to their questions — but the search left mysteries for posterity. And sagas of adventure.
- Who was first?
- What did he find?
- When did it happen?
- Where did he land?
Such questions do not cry out for answers. The course of history flowed past them long ago. Yet, the human intellect is challenged by mystery. For more than four centuries scholars have sought vainly for conclusive evidence of the landing places and routes of those bold explorers who conquered an unknown continent. We seek answers to mountainous mysteries simply "because they are there."
It is ironic that the first part of the United States to be discovered was one of the last to be fully settled. It harbors its mysteries so carefully that, still today, we are intrigued.
More than a century before the Pilgrims, Europeans found their way to the endless shores of a new continent — searching variously for gold, glory and God. Those who luckily turned west to Mexico, or south to Peru, satisfied their ambitions.
But those who first sought their fate north-ward on the Florida peninsula of mainland America found only hardship and death.
Inasmuch as history is written by the winners, we know much about Cortes and Pizarro. They were conquistadores — or "conquerors" — who subdued the Aztecs and Incas.
Not so well known are the adelantados — or "advancers who go boldly onward." Their job was to pacify and colonize, in many ways more difficult than conquest. Ponce de Leon, Panfilo de Narvaez, and Hernando de Soto were of the latter category. They struggled valiantly against impossible odds.
We do not know the name of the first European to set foot on the southern doorstep of U.S.A. — even though the official honor was assigned much later to Ponce de Leon.
The true discoverer of North America possibly was a scout of Columbus' second voyage when the great admiral cruised the West Indies seeking a route to China. From his journals we know that Columbus at first believed Indian reports that Colba (Cuba) was a big island ten days of travel from a mainland. After a few weeks of coasting Cuba he was persuaded by Martin Alonzo Pinzon, master of the Pinta, that Cuba was a peninsula.
Pinzon, and his brother Vicente, had a penchant for wandering off on their own to claim discovery honors. They often sailed ahead of the Santa Maria in defiance of the Admiral's orders, and Martin raced home in an attempt to reveal discovery first. Vicente asserted he was first to circle Cuba in 1499 on his way to explore the South American coast and discover Brazil. If so, he may have made a clandestine visit to Florida also.
Explorers in those days were reluctant initially to say much about where they had been and when. Rights of discovery were tightly controlled by kings and popes. It did no good to find new land unless you could sell its riches back home. To exploit unclaimed territory, one had to have an "asciento," or patent, from a government able to hold onto the discovery.
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