What If Columbus Never Reached America ?

What if Columbus never reached America? The United States as it exists today — its language, its laws, its borders — sits downstream of one voyage that came far closer to failing than most people realize, right down to a near-mutiny just days before land was sighted. In this episode, we trace exactly how that single 1492 voyage shaped the formation of the United States — then ask what happens if it never happens at all. Spoiler: contact with the Americas was still likely, but which country got there, when, and how, could have changed almost everything about the nation we know today. This is Otherwise — where we take real science and history and push it one step further. 🔔 Subscribe for weekly deep dives into the biggest 'what if' questions in science, history, and the unknown.