who was the first european explorer to explore land that became part of the united states
Exploration of North America Aragon King Ferdinand II sent Juan Ponce de León from the fledgling colony on Hispaniola to verify rumors of undiscovered land to the northwest. On April 2, 1513, Ponce de León disembarked on the northeast coast of what he named Florida for the crown. The exact location is disputed, but historians have offered the possibilities of St. Augustine, Ponce de León Inlet, and Melbourne Beach. He encountered the powerful Gulf Stream and found a passage through the Florida Keys to land on the southwestern Gulf Coast of Florida on the Gulf of Mexico. Again, the exact location is disputed.[3] While it is true that Columbus visited Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands in 1493, Ponce de Leon was the first known European to reach the present-day United States mainland.[4]