Show GREAT MOMENTS IN N H HISTORY 0 9 0 4 by ed located blow how columbus pro proved ved the world was tad round in 1492 in a jerk erk water town in italy there lived a studious but nevertheless poor geezer by the name of christopher columbus now chris was possessed of an idea that the earth was round not flat and you gotta give him credit cause it was pretty good logic for those he wanted to set sail heading w west est days in order to prove his theory and eventually return to the port he had sailed from by simply go going ing in a straight line thus going completely around the world see the other gentry around the joints where he hung out just mur aured something about bats in the bellfoy and gave poor chris the horse laff whenever he tried to explain his idea to them so he kept wandering on in search of someone who would believe him all through italy he traveled then went into spam spain where he confronted the king himself himsel ha ila ha laughed the monarch as his favorite wife manicured his toenails the world round dont be a moron blow bub blo blow so christopher columbus left but not discouraged and pro ceedee to another post office zone 1 this time a place called gal portugal s queen was quite a looker isabella was her name and her espoused ferdinand not to be confused with the bull of the same name had become too en grossed in the affairs of the state to pay much attention to his lady any more therefore when colum bus came bowing hand kissing and sweet talking his way into isabell s chambers she was swept complete ly off her feet and received him with great enthusiasm and chris being the kind of a romeo he was took advantage of his position and not long afterward had talked queen isabella into financing his expedition after a few months delay due to the shipbuilders strike three fine galleons were built and ready to sail west with columbus as their captain he went aboard the san ta maria which was to be the flagship he had two other ships with him the pinta and the I 1 nina the nina was practically excess baggage but as the eppedi I 1 tion could only afford one clock it was put aboard her then once a day at exactly the same hour the ship would come alongside the santamaria santa maria and the bosn bos n would hook up the loudspeaker and shout nina clock and all alls s well in this way the nina got her name likewise the pinta was named lafter after the job she did the only thing aboard the pinta was a cargo of rum once a day the nina and the santa maria w would pull up to the pinta and the sailors would line up at the rail and call over how much rum they wanted for the day As they all spoke portuguese thy could call for either a pinta a quarta a halfa balfa callona or a callona this rum was pretty potent stuff and the tars had to keep on the job so they were allowed one pinta a day they d all holler to the pin ta and say give me a pinta or I 1 wanta pinta or just pinta I 1 hence the ship became known as the pinta andi anyhow after months and months of horsing around out on the At lantice the crew became convinced that chris was as sus pecked a little and threw him in the brig putting chains on him just to make sure he wouldn t go over the hill shortly afterward they were sorry for the cry land ho echoed over the ship as a sailor in the crows crow s nest spotted a dot on the horizon and land it was palm trees shrubbery coco nuts dirt Could rit be anything but land As the ships came closer other signs of land began to ap pear one sign said FREE PARK ING another read NO VACANCY while still another said KILROY WAS HERE overjoyed the weary sailors hastened to go ashore and ano have a big time so each was given a I 1 three day pass by columbus who admonished dont spend all your money in one place so after three days of carousing the sailors loaded the ship with fruits coconuts bananas spices hula skirts comic books and other souvenirs of amezuca and the fleet headed east again little did chris know he had discovered a whole continent where someday civilize civi liza tion would flourish and democrats go hog wild I 1 he figured he d hit so some m e other part of europe or asia 0 on n the other side of the world queen isabella was pleased no end when columbus returned and even though the voyage was re carded at first as a failure it more or less proved that the earth was round the only trouble was that some character named amerigo vespucci stepped in at the right time and got the place named aft er him As for poor old columbus he bad to go on relief after a few years and finally died without having even so much as a liberty ship named after him |