Columbus Day: I have a better idea…

Today is, for lots of folks, a holiday. Sadly, it’s a holiday that pits people I love against each other. My mom was an Italian immigrant and I’m a very proud, first generation Italian-American. I also lived and worked through most of my 20’s in the Northern Rockies and Plains, and I have old and good friends who are Native American. This puts me in a rather joyless space between the celebration of my own heritage and disrespect for another. There is, actually, an easy way out of this.

First, a little background:

Columbus Day nominally celebrates the arrival of the Spanish in the Western Hemisphere in the guise of a three-ship reconnaissance led by a Genovese sea captain. That’s not really why the modern holiday was formally declared by Roosevelt in 1934. It became an official state holiday in Colorado in 1907 and a federal holiday in the Depression largely through the lobbying efforts of Italian-American union members (my own Grandfather, Giuseppe, was a proud member of the BOWE and very likely supported the call for a national holiday) and in the Knights of Columbus Lodge. Italians were among the great waves of immigrants from Europe and Asia that built and maintained the American rail network, dug coal, logged, made steel and otherwise built the 20th century’s economy and infrastructure. These same immigrants overcame a depression and fought and died in two world wars for their adopted country. Like every wave of immigrants, they were treated badly by those who were already here, and who viewed them as a threat to the job market, as well as dirty and prone to criminal behavior (sound familiar?). They craved recognition and acceptance and respect, and Columbus Day gave them a sense that they were an important part of America.

Sadly, the symbol they chose to celebrate was a mighty poor choice for a couple reasons.

First, Columbus was not an Italian. He was Genovese. If this seems like a fine point, remember that the country we know as Italy was founded after the Resorgiamento in the mid to late 19th century. Citizens of the powerful city-state of Genova in the 15th and 16th centuries wouldn’t have known what the hell was meant by an “Italian Nation”. There was no such thing. There was a peninsula called Italy and there were regional dialects of a language that was eventually codified (mostly through the Tuscan dialect) as the Italian language, but there was no red, white and green Tricolore’ when Signore Colombo “sailed the ocean blue” and there wouldn’t be for over three and a half centuries.

The second reason speaks to history, to character and to historical tragedy.

Columbus was not the first European to “find” the New World. There were Norse settlements in the Canadian Maritimes some couple-three centuries before he left Spain. His voyage was an impressive accomplishment, but hardly a first discovery. And of course, both the Northmen and the Spanish found innumerable people already living here who were surprised to be “discovered” as they did not view themselves as lost.

Columbus was a merchant captain in the employ of the Spanish crown. He was typical of his profession, his times, and his culture. Every European country unquestionably assumed the superiority of their own cultures, religions and traditions, and the inferiority of the cultures, religions and traditions of the many countries they colonized. This assumption was the justification for a lengthy list of abominable crimes ranging from slavery through rape, murder and theft to out-and-out genocide. The incidents are many, the head-count appalling, and the documentation voluminous. There is nothing to argue about here. Columbus and his men had blood on their hands pretty early on, as did the many Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, French, and English colonizers that followed him. Christopher Columbus is not a heroic figure, and the arrival of the Europeans is nothing to celebrate, especially if your family was here already when they showed up.

This is not an argument for failing to celebrate Italian-American heritage. We deserve recognition for who we are and what we did. We just need someone else to celebrate. Fortunately, we have a better choice.

I give you San Giuseppe! 

Saint Joseph’s Day, March 19th, was and still is traditionally celebrated as a festa for many Italians, especially Sicilians and Southern Italians and their North American descendants. There are already parades for Saint Joseph’s Day in New Orleans, New York and other cities with big Italian-American populations, and there are traditional dishes, music and customs associated with the holiday. Given the date two days after Saint Patrick’s Day, this sets up a week-long celebration of immigration that has the potential to turn into a prolonged and quite merry whoop-ti-do with lots of eating, drinking and music! What could wrong with that?

I’m aware that I’m one little voice in a big wilderness of anger, but this Son of Italy is all for giving our Native American brothers and sisters our October day back to them as a gift to celebrate their heritage, and for reclaiming our old traditional day in March to celebrate ours. I’m also in favor of the change for who it represents. The biblical references to Joseph depict a quiet blue-collar guy who was a good dad, and who decided to trust and support his wife when she gave him some surprising news. This strikes me as a better role modal than a Genovese mercenary. Being a good father and a kind, trusting and supportive husband is a real accomplishment. I think we need more of that these days.