1. IT PAVED THE WAY FOR THE MODERN-DAY AMERICAN COWBOY.
Long before Western cowboys and their trusty steeds herded cattle, there weren’t any horses or cows in the Americas. But in 1492, Columbus established a settlement on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola. The following year, the explorer returned to the island, and brought longhorn cattle and horses with him.
Soon after, in 1519, Spanish explorer Hernán Cortés and his soldiers arrived in what’s today called Mexico, their sights set on conquering the wealthy Aztec empire. They, too, brought horses and the Spanish eventually established ranches and imported cattle to Mexico and the Caribbean. These animals eventually made their way to the present-day United States, paving the way for westward expansion and—yes—the emergence of the American cowboy.
2. IT REDEFINED WHAT IT MEANT TO BE WEALTHY.
The influx of gold and silver from the New World shook the foundations of the European economy to its core. Where land ownership—and the rents charged by landowners—once determined wealth, the arrival of large quantities of gold and silver, both of which had formerly been in short supply, caused prices to skyrocket. This dramatic shift is what historians refer to as “The Price Revolution”: Landlords on fixed incomes suffered as the value of their incomes dropped and the debts owed to them also shrank. Trade soon replaced land-ownership as the most expedient way to achieve wealth.
3. IT TURNED THE WORLD ON TO TOBACCO.
For better or worse, the Age of Exploration introduced modern European civilization to the practice of smoking. When Columbus arrived in the Bahamas in 1492, residents of the island of San Salvador gave the explorer a gift of dry tobacco leaves. Columbus didn’t understand their purpose, and threw them overboard. Later, he’d write that the locals “drank smoke.” Soon after, Columbus and his expedition arrived in Cuba, where locals also practiced the curious custom. Two members tried it for themselves, and reportedly became hooked.
In subsequent years, other European explorers encountered tobacco, and in the 1550s, tobacco seeds arrived in Spain and Portugal. Europeans used the leaf for medicinal purposes—and eventually, recreational ones. Meanwhile, the Spanish fed Europe’s cravings by cultivating the leaf; they controlled the tobacco trade until the 17th century, when John Rolfe of the Virginia Colony first shipped tobacco to England.