Correcting revisionist history

The Sunday Star Trib opinion pages had two references in it this weekend (one of them being from Garrisson, the liberal (t)wit, Keillor) about how it was Leif Erickson and the Vikings who first discovered America; about 500 years before Columbus. Well I’m sorry to throw this monkey wrench into the works, but everybody who’s had an opinion on this over the years, historians included, have all been wrong.

The real story of who first discovered America actually starts about 500 years before the Vikings, in a little village of what is now southern Poland. Stanley (the Forest) Gumpinski was on his way to a little village just east of Krakow to purchase a pig; but instead of taking a right in Krakow, he took a left. He kept traveling until he hit the Atlantic Ocean. Being a typical male, he simply refused to ask directions. He felt it was taking a little longer than it should, but he persevered. Thinking it was a big lake, and he didn’t feel like walking around it, he got himself a little rowboat and proceeded to start rowing. He felt this was taking a little longer than it should also, but he persevered. Upon landing in what is now America, he kept going and going. He met numerous indigenous peoples along the way and learned many new things. One of them was how to stuff buffalo intestines with meat, and which the people he met had called Kielbasa. He kept traveling and traveling. He discovered a number of huge rivers, one of which he named the Mississippinski River. He met a local gal named Sacajawinski, and she offered to help him find the little village; well, she got them totally lost, and Stanley still would not ask for directions and they ended up covering nearly the entire area west of the Mississippinski. He eventually made it to the Pacific Ocean. He was starting to get a little p.o.’d by this time; but he persevered and again took off in a little rowboat. He landed upon a little group of islands, and the first peoples to meet him greeted him with ‘How are ye,’ which he thought was the name of the island. (note, this was about 1300 years before Captain Cook) Anyway, he kept persevering. Let me speed this up from here, the story’s getting long. He kept going, hit more land, met alot of Chinese people, bought a little silk and other trinkets, climbed some little mountain he called Everestski, got in a little fix in the middle east and kicked the butt of some guy named Mohammed who gave him a hard time, learned about a new up and coming religion called Christianity, and finally made it back to the general area where he grew up. He found the village, traded some silk for the pig, (these people loved it and decided to try and get more, so they hired some Italian guy named Marco to go back) took the pig home, made some kielbasa from the pig, and proceeded to become a kielbasa mogul and became rich. With the money, he started up a church and continued to give at least 10% of his money to the church (one of his descendants actually became pope in modern times) and lived happily ever after. He never did get credit though for discovering the new world. People just started making Polish jokes after they learned he took a wrong turn and started calling him Wrong-way Gumpinski. A sad historical end to such an important historical figure.

Now the truth is out, let it sweep across the blogosphere.