There was a time when all the tapestry of this land here now and before us was sacred. In her writing Islanders In The Stream she portrayed the history of the new comers, us, our fathers who on a sloop with broken mast adrift in a choppy seas and surrounded by large sharks. A boat sails far off on the hazy horizon.
Many of our generations never bothered to learn Colonial History from the narrow narratives of our British masters. So sad. These islands and cays appeared in the historical records of Portugal long before Columbus so too the Amazon. I misplaced my National Geographics The Tigris Expedition. On a handmade papyrus reed scientist-explorer Thor Heyerdahl crossed the Atlantic in 1969–70 to demonstrate that the currents took him from Africa and the Mediterranean Seas to Central America, also Cat Island.
The Bahamas' history in its purest tapestry includes the voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492 while the Portuguese used our fresh water in Bimini for hundreds of years to then set out along the Gylf Stream coming from The Amazon.

In 1648 The Eleutheran Adventures arrived here with their slaves. In 1656 Europeans settled here. The Historical data needs to be clearly clarified as Columbus, seeking to replace the routes of Marco Polo in search of India's and Afghanistan's rugs, satin clothes, green gems and other precious stones curiously named or region West Indies. But my how wrong he was. His person, cannot be blamed for the Portuguese slavery to the Amazon. The British followed. We must restore October 12th., and the tens of billions in tourist dollars it brought to The Bahamas and will bring in the future.

Any excuse to needlessly spend taxpayer dollars.

That might be the most ignorant statement ever made and printed in a newspaper. Here was a lady that was not only an INTERNATIONALLY known scholar regarding the history of The Bahamas, but more importantly, actually recorded it for prosperity. If not to honor such a stalwart of our country, exactly WHO should "taxpayer dollars" be spent on?
You sound like a person who also feels "all of the historic (old) bulidings should be torn down, and NEW buildings built in their place...."

She allowed herself to be used and abused by the leadership of the PLP propaganda machine who needed a scholarly facade added to their devious playing of the race card to win national elections. No one knows this better than Sean McWeeney, Sr.

You are laughable and just don't know this lady. I wad amazed at the documents she showed me of Bahamian historical significance. Have you ever seen a will spelling out to bequeath to another valuables which included of priority: aspirations of pants, buttons, a fishing hook? And to live past 30 years of age was considered old, with 25 years the average death. Then you don't know what it is to be Bahamian. Or the old captains logs that spoke of sailors enduring bites at night on land then having massive infects from centipedes. You need to read the very rare books in Archives, all of which Doctor Saunders read, to have an idea if her vast historical knowledge.

You should also read books on what many American families had to endure during the Great Depression and on the atrocities that the Jews experienced under the Third Reich. We are not as special as some might think when it comes to the suffering our ancestors had to endure as a result of being sold into slavery by their own tribal chieftains along the West Coast of Africa.

https://www.rt.com/news/579988-eu-slave…

The whole EU took the historical bame with reparations for slavery in The Caribbean. Brave boldness will see rewards it appears. Too sad Doctor Saunders just missed this historical event. Columbus was dead nearly 200 years when African slavery to Caribbean was born. So he nor his ghost is to blame as we can now see. Fir all its historical and especially monetary value The complete tapestry of Bahamian history which Doctor Saunders held ad sacred should be repaired and Discovery Day returned.