New York, October 11 (RHC)-- More than 50 U.S. cities -- including Los Angeles, Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Austin, Texas -- celebrated Indigenous Peoples’ Day, in place of the federal holiday honoring Christopher Columbus, the Italian explorer who massacred and enslaved Arawak indigenous people while opening the door to the European colonization of the Americas. 
 
In New York City, protesters rallied at a 115-year-old statue of Christopher Columbus near Central Park, calling for its removal and for the city to make the second Monday of each October Indigenous Peoples’ Day.  The protest came as the New York Police Department ringed the statue in metal barricades and said it was providing round-the-clock surveillance of the monument.