GET EDUCATED
Depending on where you live, today is Columbus Day, Indigenous Peoples' Day, or both. If you see Indigenous Peoples' Day on your calendar, it's thanks to activists and organizers who have pushed to reimagine this date since the 1970s. Berkeley, California, was the first city to mark today as Indigenous Peoples' Day in 1992, as a protest against the 500th anniversary of Columbus' arrival (The Nation). In 1990, South Dakota became the first state to replace Columbus Day with Native American Day (KOTA). Today, 17 states and D.C. honor Native Americans on the second Monday of October. And in 2019, Maine, Vermont, New Mexico and D.C. stopped recognizing Columbus Day by name altogether (Pew Research Center).
These actions were sparked by the fact that Christopher Columbus is not the famed explorer many of us learned about in school. His travels here sparked the rapid colonization of the Americas as we know them today. He enslaved and mutilated Indigenous peoples as soon as he arrived. He was financially incentivized to reap value at any cost from the lands he visited, and did so (Biography). He wasn't the first European to "discover" America; the Vikings had visited five centuries earlier (Britannica). He didn't even set foot in what is now the continental United States. Even the names of the ships that many of us memorized in school as children are likely false (Washington Post).
"Once you know the historical record of Columbus' impact on Indigenous peoples, you can't unlearn it."
– Montana State Sen. Shane Morigeau (Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes), to the Associated Press
By centering one man as a famed explorer, we erase the stories of the millions of Indigenous people already here stewarding the land. It's one of the many ways that, in our nation, we continue to center the stories of our oppressors over those they harmed. Although changing a holiday's name is not enough to repair that harm, it reflects a conscious decision to shift the story away from those in power and toward those impacted.
Unsurprisingly, in October 2025, President Trump signed a proclamation calling Christopher Columbus "the original American hero" and pledging to "reclaim" his legacy (White House). As with so many things, this administration seems hellbent on reversing even the smallest acknowledgments of harm against marginalized people in this nation.
Despite this, local communities continue to take action. Late last month, the Oklahoma City Council voted unanimously to make Indigenous Peoples' Day permanent, so the city's celebration at the First Americans Museum – now one of the largest in the country – no longer depends on who is mayor (The Oklahoman). Chicago confirmed last year that its Columbus statues won't return to Grant Park or Little Italy (WTTW). Columbus, Ohio, which took its statue down from City Hall in 2020, is working with Indigenous architects and designers to reimagine the space (WOSU).
More importantly, some places are taking more tangible action to reclaim not just Native history, but Native land. In 2024, more than 1,000 acres in New York's Tully Valley were returned to the Onondaga Nation, the first land returned since the U.S. and New York broke the 1794 Treaty of Canandaigua (Onondaga Nation). But a separate lakeshore return near Syracuse has stalled for 14 years, in part over a Columbus statue downtown (AP).
Some oppose the switch because they don't want to erase the Italian American contribution to this country. Italian immigrants have celebrated Columbus Day in the U.S. since 1792 (Harvard), and Italian Americans lobbied to make it a national holiday in the early 1900s (Time). The first national Columbus Day came in 1892, the year after a mob in New Orleans lynched 11 Italian immigrants (Mob Museum). Ironically, despite its name, this holiday has always stood for repairing harm done to those marginalized by our colonizers – a sentiment that doesn't change with a rename. We can continue to advocate for both.
Renaming a holiday alone was never the end goal. As Joseph Lee wrote last year, the name changes were real wins, but it became too easy for non-Indigenous people to treat them as "mission accomplished" (The Nation). The bigger asks – treaty rights, language, land – are still waiting on us. So, as you honor Indigenous Peoples' Day, let your efforts extend beyond today and into tomorrow. It's easy to acknowledge something one day a year, but far more necessary to center the voices and needs of Indigenous communities in all aspects of your life.
Sources: The Nation, KOTA, Pew Research Center, Biography, Britannica, Washington Post, Associated Press, White House, The Oklahoman, WTTW, WOSU, Onondaga Nation, Harvard Gazette, Time, Mob Museum.
