User talk:Soccerstopper

Giovanni da Verrazzano (also spelled Verrazano) was born in Tuscany, Italy in 1485 and died in 1528 in the Lesser Antilles. He was a Florentine explorer sailing under the French flag. He was the first European to sight New York and Narragansett bays.

While growing up in Florence, Verrazzano received an excellent education. Later he moved to Dieppe in France and entered the French maritime service. He traveled several times to the Levant. In 1523, Francis I agreed to provide Verrazzano with two ships to set sail and discover the westward passage to Asia. In January of 1524, Verrazzano set sail, his vessel being named La Dauphine (a term traditionally used to refer to the eldest son of the king - the individual immediately in line to the throne).

In early March he arrived at Cape Fear in North Carolina. He then continued northward, exploring the eastern seaboard of North America as far as Nova Scotia. He made several discoveries including New York Bay, Block Island and Narragansett Bay. He was also the first European explorer to name newly discovered North American sites after persons and placed in the Old World. Without question, Verrazzano was the first European to enter New York bay in 1524. It was another 85 years, in 1609, that Henry Hudson, sailing on behalf of the Dutch East India Company and the individual usually associated with the discovery, would again sail a European vessel into the area.

Virtually unknown, Verrazzano was raised from obscurity by the efforts of John N. LaCorte, founder of the Italian Historical Society of America, who was instrumental in having the bridge spanning the entrance to New York Harbor at the narrows and joining  Staten Island and Brooklyn named The Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge.

The Italian Historical Society was also responsible for the placement of the Verrazzano Monument at Battery Park in New York.

Giovanni da Verrazzano was born in 1485 in the castle of Da Verrazzano's family, on the Chianti hills 19 km away from Florence. Raised in Florence, Giovanni later moved to Dieppe in France and entered the French naval service. In the early 1520s the east coast of what is now the United States of America - between Florida (discovered by Spanish) and Newfoundland (Canada, discovered by English and Portuguese explorers) was largely unexplored. In 1524 the French King Francis I decided to send out an expedition to the North American east coast, and he chose Giovanni da Verrazzano to lead the expedition.

In early March he arrived at Cape Fear in North Carolina. He then continued northward, exploring the eastern seaboard of North America as far as Nova Scotia. Verrazzano was the first European to enter the bay of New York; NYC remembers him with the Verrazzano Bridge, joining Staten Island and Brooklyn at the entrance to New York Harbour.

The life of Giovanni finished badly. In 1528 he follow the lesser Antilles, where it seems he met the natives of the island of Guadeloupe. Unfortunately, the natives were not a friendly tribe that wanted to trade but a cannibalistic people who killed Giovanni and ate him, before the eyes of his brother Gerolamo. The ship was too far away to give gunfire support.

Gerolamo came back to Europe and later, Florence, where he drew the map of his brother's discoveries and told the unhappy story of the great but unfortunate explorer.