So, now it’s official: Columbus Day will, in Maine anyway, be called Indigenous Peoples Day? Too bad the rest of the country couldn’t do that – but that’s Washington, D.C,. for you. Of course, they won’t do that – and to Mainers, I say, “It’s too little, too late. Same as giving Vietnam veterans some solace. Again, too little, too late.”

What the U.S. did to the Native American is beyond comprehension. These crimes are somehow missing from what’s said and our history books.

How many people know that turkeys were hated in this country as wild birds that were deemed not suitable for eating, but officials went to work and, through false advertising, brainwashed the public into believing that we called them “turkeys” because they came from Turkey (they’re actually native to North America). Again, look it up!

Another puzzler is that we call our country “America.” As far as I know, it was named for a later visitor to America, Amerigo Vespucci.

Sorry, my friends, history is full of inaccuracies and lies. Ask any revisionist! But, thankfully, we can recognize our Native Americans. We owe them so much … but again, too late.

Frank Slason

Somerville

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