Learn about the early life of the man credited with discovering the new world.

The European powers were obsessed with finding new trade routes in hope of bringing money and a better life to their people.

Columbus was born into a very poor family, and became motivated to escape that poverty. He was self-taught and brilliant, and became interested in the "science" of the day, becoming a seaman.

He was part of a convoy that was attacked by Portuguese war ships. The ships destroyed and the captains killed, he swam towards the Portuguese shore where he would spend the next ten years studying mapmaking and researching the possibility of a great land if one sailed west.