The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1892-10-28
COLUMBUS DAY.

Of the discovery of America by
Christopher Columbus. In the
morning appropriate exercises were
held in all the rooms at the public
schools. AT the High School there
was an interesting program and a
number of members of Ent Post, G..
A. X. were present. In the after
noon a parade took place at o'clock,
which was participated in by Prof.
Brooks band Friendship Fire Com
pany, pupils of the public schools
and Normal School, members of town
council, school directors and citizens
generally. The procession formed on
Market squire and went up to the
Normal School, and countermarched,
apd then to the fair ground, where the
program announced last week was
carried out All the students were
decorated with the national colors.
and many carried flags. Several
thousand people attended, filling the
grand stand, and the track near it.
F. P. Drinker, President of Council
made an opening address. He said:
LADIES AND GENrLEMAN:
We are here, as everyone knows,
to do honor to the spirit and memory
of Christopher Columbus. No need
to rehearse the story of the superb
old admiral-every bright boy and
girl in the land knows it-yet we
never tire of it. Foolish persons
like Albion Tourjee have called HIM
pirate, and other bad names, but
they have only belittled themselves;
he was all the same the grea. and
good man who "In I492 sailed far
DER the ocean blue and discovered
America. Surmounting every
difficulty, he sailed westward for
many weeks over lonely, mysterious
and unexplored water; his men grew
weary and frightened as their frail
ship plunged on and on into the
awful unknown, and at last they mutin-
led outright, but his will and mind
managed them. as one great will and
mind always does manage the un-
thinking crowd. He kept them on
their course till his weary and anxious
spirit was cheered by the cry of
"land land !" He did not reach the
main land on his first voyage.
Amerigo Vespucci first reached that
and wrote about it, and so it happens
we now live in North America in
stead of North Colombo. The brave
Christoforo died 3S6 years ago, but
We can and do still honor and
venerate him in our hearts and lives
as the goodly turnout of our splendid
ly conducted schools, our fast thin
ming G. A. r. ranks, Sons of Veterans
handsomely uniformed orders, brave
hremen and good citizens show.
His is still nobler example for our
boys to follow-not to the North
pole (unless in the interest of the
Bloomsburg Ice Plant) but to brave
lives and deeds. The grand old man
OF Genoa, as has been said, died near
y 400 years ago, but the phantoms Of
the Santa Maria, Nina and Pinta.
and the spirit of their great com
mander still move upon the face Of
the deep and there they will move so
long as wind and water meet. And
so we meet to-day as is meet to
honor him. Our Public and Normal
schools to entertain you with pleasant
singing and declamations, our
eminent townsman, Col. John G.
Freeze, to speak to you, and the band
to play. The next thing on the pro-
gram is singing. which will be follow
ed by prayer from Rev. P. A. He'll
man.
After singing and declarations, and
prayer, Col. Freeze delivered an ad
dress. We are permitted to produce
1t here in full. He spoke as follows :
MR.. CHAIRMAN
So many things are becoming un-
settled in the light of late investisa,
tons, that even the day upon which
Columbus is supposed to have dis
covered America, has come to be dis
puted. We have been taught that it
was October ra, 1892, but we are now
assured that owing to the change in
the Calendar it should be the 2Ist. 1t
Is even gravely disputed whether Col
umbus discovered America at all and
II he did, that he was not by any
means the first navigator who set foot
upon some part, portion or place of
this great continent, or of its outlying
islands. The approach of this ami
versary has greatly awakened and
stimulated a re-examination of these
questions, and the dispute is too re-
cent, and the field of historical re-
Search too vast and the results as yet
too uncertain to allow us to state any
conclusion upon the subject, or hazard a
conjecture as to what may be the
outcome of the great debate. The
foremost and probably the best equip.
ped write upon the questions here
mentioned iS Mr. Iohn FiSke hut a