Columbus was certainly beaten

There is a growing consensus among some archaeologists and anthropologists that there is more to the story of the Americas' discovery than first thought. From the mysterious heads of the Olmec people that have seemingly African features to Chinese anchors in places where it would be centuries until the Europeans explored; from the evidence of Viking settlements in northeastern North America to the possibility of the ancient Polynesians sailing around the pacific there seems to be more and more evidence that Columbus was not even the first to sail completely across an ocean. In fact we know he was not even the first European to set foot in North America! 

The image below is an interpretation of a map discovered in 1972 by Dr. Hendon Harris in Taiwan that allegedly shows that the Chinese had mapped the earth centuries before the Europeans. 

Source of the photograph of the map above and the information concerning it
http://www.asiaticfathers.com/