San Diego has a very fine Maritime Museum that’s comprised of actual ships instead of only pictures or models of them. A few years ago the Museum completed its project to build a full size sea-going replica of San Salvador, Cabrillo’s ship that he sailed exploring the west coast of North America as far north as Pt Mendocino, which he named. The first European to do so leaving Guatemala in June of 1542. He discovered San Diego Bay, a natural all-weather harbor, as well as the California Channel Islands, and Monterey Bay (but not San Francisco Bay), plus other sites. For decades now he has been monikered a Portuguese navigator somehow in the service of the Spanish Crown. The Museum recently published a treatise on Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo’s life as a Spanish Conquistador, a native of Palma del Rio in Andalusia of Spain. This is all based on newly discovered and translated records in Spanish archives. For us in southern California there have been many “corrections” back and forth on the correct pronunciation of Cabrillo, which differs between Spanish and Portuguese. (I was involved in one only a couple of weeks ago!!) That is now settled!!
“Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo: A Voyage of Rediscovery”; Wendy Kramer, PhD, Mains’l Haul, vol. 55 (1-4), 2019, Maritime Museum of San Diego.