Saw final segment of Grant last night,

[Retrograde]

16. Large parts of the US were never British colonies

The southwest was Spanish, and then Mexican. Much of the central part of the country was French (or Spanish or French, depending on when you look). Hawai'i was an independent country. Most of the present inhabitants are not descended from the early British settlers: there were waves of immigration from other places: Ireland and Germany in the 1840s, eastern and southern Europe in the 1900s, Latin Americans and Asians later on. But we still hold to this "British heritage" myth, and the notion that the settlement of the 1st 13 states was the template for everything.

FWIW, there's a building in Santa Fe that's been a government building since 1608 - before the British starved at Jamestown. And there are towns in that state that pre-date Columbus.