There are conspiracy theories that say the the United States is still a British colony. I am skeptical. Why? Aluminum. If the USA did not actually achieve Independence, then they would still be saying Al-eewww-meee-neee-ummm instead of the way it is suppose to be pronounced had English not progressed the way nature meant it to. 
Have you checked out the epic wikipedia edit war over this topic? Talk:Aluminium/Spelling - Wikipedia
What a laugh. I really enjoyed this from that webpage: “There seems to be more venom in the aluminium/aluminum caesium/cesium discussion pages than those of the the holocaust denial page.”