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Nice!! Popular Mechanics from 1963! Unfortunately I do not believe any of the "evidence" in that article has been corroborated in the last 50 years, and some has been debunked. (Also, I always love a good Prince Madoc reference!)

It also doesn't really mention any finds of Roman or Phoenician shipwrecks in the Gulf. The primary archeological find referenced is the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca_head, which is actually a pretty interesting artifact since it seems authentic and there is still significant controversy regarding how it got to the discovery site. Since everyone involved in the find is now dead we may never be able to confirm that it was/wasn't a hoax.

I've seen a lot about the inscription stuff (which people find all over the place) but most of it ends up being hoaxes or graffiti.

If you like this kind of stuff, check out http://www.1421.tv/. It's an interesting and pretty compelling book, though the mainstream history/archeology community considers it basically fiction.

Just read a great book about China's 'discovery' of the America around 1421 and they were able to get their junks around Greenland, a feat not otherwise possible, but it was warm that year.
No idea how many SUVs were on the road back then, so I wonder how we can compare CO2 emissions?

I thought the Chinese discovered it in 1421?

Gavin Menzies' book "1421" makes a good argument that the Chinese treasure fleets did manage to sail along the north coast of Greenland, and explore Siberia, which argues that there were several major routes that could be navigated by the large junks of the day. The evidence that they actually sailed to the North pole is pretty thin - but then again it is hard to see what evidence they could have bought back that would convince anyone. And most of the other stuff they surveyed and plotted has turned out to be supported by other evidence, so why not?

Anyhow, while we are knocking holes in the article, polar bears are quite happy to swim 50 miles or more out to sea. That little crack won't worry them. We need to be worried about global warming, but the issue isn't helped by hype like that.

<a href="http://www.1421.tv/">"1421: The Year China Discovered the World"</a>

The ancient Greeks, like everyone else, "stand on the shoulders of giants". But their own achievements obscure their own predecessors. Read some research like Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings, for evidence of global navigational skills of even more ancient peoples. If you don't think our Eurocentric history obscures the navigational achievements of prior civilizations, check out some of the Chinese global exploration prior to Columbus. Or documentation of African navigation among the Americas. Then there's the Pacific diaspora, which covered an entire hemisphere of Earth without "landmarks", at sea. Beware of Greeks bearing gifts: just where did they get them?

Check out Gavin Menzies' "1421: The Year China Discovered The World", website is http://www.1421.tv/. American readers may know the book's subtitle as "The Year China Discovered America".

I'd argue that it has the most probable (and certainly best-supported from actual evidence) explanation of the Piri Reis map - Chinese navigators circumnavigated the globe from 1421-1425, and drew up maps along the way.

Read the book if you have a chance, it's one of the most entertaining histories I've read in a while.

China is likely to send people to Mars, sooner than later. It would let them have a "China First" claim, beat the Americans, and reap all the scientific/industrial benefits. Plus, it *is* the "Red Planet", so the propaganda value for them is not only vast, but vaster than ours. If you don't think China can do it, I suggest you look to history.

Read 1421- The Year China Discovered The World, by Gavin Menzies. This book and it's author have been getting a lot of attention from the archeological community lately 9 see also here, here, here, etc. There's a lot of evidence that suggest that Zhang He's fleet continued east to the americas. Early Western explorers reportedly encountered chinese-speaking peoples in both South and North America.