A longtime reader sent me an email the other day with a question that perplexed me: What happened to Christopher Columbus' golden buckles, or more accurately, the gold-painted buckles on his boots?

My correspondent was not, of course, talking about the explorer's real boots, but about the black marble pair that now adorn his statue at San Jose City Hall. Someone stole the famous Genoan's buckles? This sounded like hold-the-phone-Martha news.

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