Welcome to the "New World" by Lucy
Gordan
Last week on the front
page of the New York Times was a story entitled: “Arizona Enacts
Stringent Law on Immigration”. It began: “Governor Jan Brewer
of Arizona signed the nation’s toughest bill on illegal
immigration into law on Friday.
Its aim is to identify,
prosecute, and deport illegal immigrants.” The article went on
to say: “Even before she signed the bill at an afternoon news
conference in Phoenix, President Obama strongly criticized it”.
He said that Arizona’s new law threatened “to undermine basic
notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans as well as the
trust between police and our communities that is so crucial to
keeping us safe.”
With Obama’s words in mind, I decided that for my first story as
Culture Editor of www.newimmigration.eu, a native New Yorker and
an immigrant-bride to Italy in 1972, I would write about the
most famous “shrine of immigration” in the world: Ellis Island.
For the millions fleeing the hardships
first glimpse of America was a beacon
Liberty which greeted immigrant ships
Harbor. Their first taste of the new
Ellis Island, and for many it was tinged
of the old world, the
of hope, the Statue of
steaming into New York
land, however, came on
with fear.
Nicknamed the “Island of Fears” or the “Island of Tears”, it
still evokes the feelings of distress, nervousness and fear, the
agony felt by the millions of immigrants who were processed here
before being allowed to start their new life of freedom and
opportunity in America.
Just like the immigrants today coming from the “Third World” to
either the “Old World” of Europe or the “New World” of the
United States, a high proportion were men and, if married, they
usually came alone first, only sending for their wives and
family after they found steady work.
“By the time we came to New York, somehow the experience on
Ellis Island, with its constant roar in a babble of tongues,
shoving crowds, uncertainty of what would happen to you, and
tears, had aged us,” records the taped voice of Bettie Awakie, a
Ukrainian who was processed in 1921, when she was a small
child. “We didn’t want to sing anymore.”
Fleeing
such
hardships
as
famine,
poverty,
religious
persecution, or political unrest in the homelands, about 12
million immigrants—ranging from three months to 70 years, and
from almost 30 European countries—passed through the island
between 1892 and 1954.
Statistics published by the National
Archives in Washington show the most numerous migrant groups
arriving here to have been 2.5 million Italians, 2.3 million
Russian and Eastern European Jews and 2.2 million Austrians and
Hungarians.
About 3500 of them (including 1400 children and
three suicides) died and 350 babies were born at Ellis Island.
Among those destined for fame were comedians Bob Hope and Danny
Kaye, pianist Irving Berlin, vaudeville singer Al Johnson, movie
star Rudolf Valentino, mobster “Lucky Luciano”, body builder
Charles Atlas, helicopter inventor Igor Sikorsky, and poet
Khalil Gibran.
Since 1990 Ellis
Immigration Museum.
Island has been home to the National
More than 100 million Americans (about 35%
of the population), probably even Governor Brewer, have
ancestors who came through Ellis Island and every year more than
two million tourists visit the museum, making it one of
America’s top five tourist attractions.
The baggage room, with its large display of wooden crates, straw
baskets, steamer trunks, paper suitcases, burlap sacks, and
carpet bags, is where all the immigrants had to deposit their
belongings, if they had any. Like those arriving on Malta or
Lampedusa today, many had nothing.
The baggage room is the first stop for modern visitors, too.
Voice tapes are available in English, French, German, Italian,
and Spanish to assist the self-guided tours.
At the nearby
information desk, manned by rangers of the National Park
Service, you can also pick up free tickets to the 27-minute
film, Island of Hopes, Island of Tears, and the 45-minute play,
Ellis Island Stories, both about the immigration process.
Only steerage class arrivals were processed at Ellis Island.
Those travelling first or cabin class were dealt with aboard
their ships. Families were separated according to sex and often
worried that they would never see each other again.
Each immigrant was asked 34 questions beginning with “How much
money do you have?” Every day of the year an average of 5000
people
was
processed,
each
tagged
with
a
number
that
corresponded to the steamship’s manifest. The busiest day was
April 17, 1900, when 11,747 people passed through Ellis Island.
About 80% of arrivals were processed in three to five hours.
About 10% were detained and 3% were deported.
More than one million Europeans, (1,004,756 is the exact figure)
were given US entry in 1907, the island’s peak immigration
year. One-third of them settled in New York, where some streets
in Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn became more European than Europe
itself.
A few intended only to make some money and return
home.
Most, however, particularly the Russian Jews, Slovaks,
and Armenians, never wanted to go back.
On the next part of the tour you take the immigrants’ route
upstairs by the steep, gray slate cantilevered staircase.
On
the tape he museum’s chief restorer says there is a whole genre
of Ellis Island tales known as “staircase stories”. It was a
place of utter fear for the arrivals.
Their families had
already been split up and they knew from the old country that so
many uniformed government officials could only mean the worst.
The stairs took them to the Registry Room, for the infamous
medicals.
The most dreaded test was for trachoma, a chronic
contagious
conjunctivitis,
which
meant
almost
certain
deportation. If you tripped, you might have an E chalked on
your coat, for eye disease. If you seemed out of breath, it
might be H, for heart disease. L if you limped, or an X if you
seem feeble-minded or had a physical deformity. These and other
markings led to further tests, detention on the island and
possible deportation.
The air still shivers with the horror of village girls
confronted by a male doctor. The Registry Room is cavernous.
The hard wooden benches and metal railings have gone, but it
still has its white tile vaulted ceiling. “Imagine after three
weeks in the hold of a steamer with its stench of spoiled food,
sea-sickness and unwashed bodies, the constant vibrations of
throbbing engines, and seeing only water and never sky, walking
into this huge space,” says the tape. “Many worried they’d miss
their name and have to stay here forever.”
At the far end of the Registry Room, visitors begin a 14-room
exhibition, “Through America’s Gate”, that shows step-by-step
the
ordeal
experienced
by
the
immigrants.
One
is
a
reconstructed Board or Special Inquiry Room, where hearings for
detained immigrants took place.
It is complete with the
inspector’s desk, inspection cards, and identity tags worn by
immigrants
upon
debarkation,
literacy
tests
in
a
dozen
languages, medical instruments, and foreign currency from the
period. Don’t miss the graffiti by detainees awaiting hearings.
Many reminiscences that have been taped for this exhibition and
for the second-floor exhibition entitled “Peak Immigration
Years: 1880-1924”, mention food: homeland dishes the immigrants
missed the most and the new flavors, especially chewing gum, ice
cream, oatmeal with brown sugar, donuts, and bananas, many had
never tasted before. The Russians and Eastern Europeans usually
preferred America’s soft white bread, while the Italians
complained it had no taste.
On the third floor “Treasures From Home” is a collection of 1000
heirlooms—religious articles, jewelry, clothes, shoes, handembroidered linens, clocks, tools, playing cards, toys—and
photographs brought to the US by immigrants.
In the same gallery, “Ellis Island Chronicles” describes the
island’s history:
“Silent Voices” evokes the eerie period of
1934 to 1976 when it was abandoned; and “Restoring a Landmark”
documents photographically the restoration (1982-1990) of its
four-towered
65,500
square-meters,
red-brick,
French
Renaissance-style main building.
Ellis Island is America’s monument to its immigrant heritage.
Most other museums in the world were built by the rich for the
rich and cultured.
Ellis Island is a memorial to the common
man. More than 29 million Americans contributed more than $US
160 million to restore it and build The American Immigrant Wall
of Honor, which commemorates their immigrant ancestors. It has
420,000 entries, making it the largest wall of names in the
world. May the same be true one day on Lampedusa!
Open every day but Christmas Day, visiting the Statue of Liberty
and Ellis Island is an all-day excursion. As in the old days,
visitors arrive by water, but now by Circle Line ferries.
Ferries leave from Battery Park in Lower Manhattan for the 45minute ride to Ellis Island. All ferries stop at the Statue of
Liberty first.
Other Immigration Museums are located in Bremerhaven in northern
Germany Boston, Buenos Aires, Cansano (a hill town Italy’s
province of L’Aquila), Farum (a suburb of Copenhagen), Hamburg,
Melbourne, and Paris.
EPILOGUE: The new Arizona law requires immigrants to carry their
alien registration documents at all times and requires police to
question people if there is reason to suspect they are in the
United States illegally.
Failure to comply could lead to
arrest, a six-month jail sentence, and a $2,500 fine. Critics
say the law will lead to discrimination and racial profiling.
Today there were rallies against the law across the United
States: in Pheonix, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Denver, Dallas,
Houston, Las Vegas, Chicago, Washington D.C. and New York. The
Arizona law was also condemned by US Catholic bishops and
leaders of other religious faiths.