On October 12, 1973, an informal group of fifty people interested in several areas of academic research met at Westville's Yellow Creek campmeeting tabernacle for a three-day symposium on a subject of mutual concern. They came from across the nation to share information about evidence of transoceanic contacts between precolumbian Americans and ancient peoples of Europe, Asia, and Africa. A major problem was popular skepticism resulting from the scholarly dictum of NEBC, No Europeans Before Columbus. The first Westville Symposium on precolumbian transoceanic contacts became a significant event in American historiography and was followed by similar meetings there in 1974 and 1975. More than 150 people participated in this series of talks. Many who assembled at Westville became leaders in the revisionist movement in American history that grew afterward. Although strongly resisted by conservatives, this new history promised a more accurate understanding of precolumbian Americans as an interacting component of world society rather than an isolated, culturally backward segment of mankind, as the NEBC school had taught.