John Cabot

Giovanni Caboto left Italy and found backing from Henry VII, who commissioned him to search for new routes and lands across the Atlantic. In 1497 he made landfall somewhere on the North American coast — the exact spot still disputed, though both Canada and Britain settled on Cape Bonavista, Newfoundland, for the 500th anniversary. The voyage reopened a connection the Norse had made four hundred years earlier and then abandoned. Cabot likely died around 1499, his later years and final voyage lost to record.