Timeline Thursday 24 June 1497

Events on Thursday 24 June 1497 1

• 1497 John Cabot Lands in North America English-sponsored expedition reaches the coast of Newfoundland Sailing from Bristol under a patent from Henry VII, the Genoese navigator John Cabot sighted land believed to be Newfoundland or Cape Breton Island on 24 June 1497. It was the first documented European landfall on the North American mainland since the Norse voyages. Cabot claimed the territory for England, laying the basis for later English claims in North America.