Introduction. Many thousands of years before Christopher Columbusâ ships landed in the Bahamas, a different group of people discovered America: the nomadic ancestors of modern Native Americans who hiked over a âland bridgeâ from Asia to what is now Alaska more than 12,000 years ago.ntroduction. Many thousands of years before Christopher Columbusâ ships landed in the Bahamas, a different group of people discovered America: the nomadic ancestors of modern Native Americans who hiked over a âland bridgeâ from Asia to what is now Alaska more than 12,000 years ago.