The Irish as unmixable in the national pot,
1889
Caption on sign: “No dumping ground for
refuse.”
Sam’s hammer: “U.S. Public Sentiment”
Barrel: “Undesirables for America”
Dress: “Some European Officials”
”Welcome to All!” This cartoon of 1880 expresses the American’s image of his country’s
immigration policies. Caption above Uncle Sam: “U.S. Ark of Refuge.” Caption on small
sign: “Free education, free land, free speech, free ballot, free lunch”
The U.S. Hotel Badly
Needs a Bouncer. Sign
behind desk reads: “No
Beggars or Loafers
Allowed in this
Establishment.” Sign on
wall reads: “U.S. Hotel
Rules and Regulations:
Guests are Required to
Preserve Order. NO
BOMB-THROWING NO
INCENDIARY TALK.
NO COMMUNISM. NO
FENIANISM.”
Immigration cartoon protesting discriminatory immigration laws. Those not qualifying
for entrance: Jesus Christ, Abraham Lincoln, Joan of Arc, George Washington, etc. Art
Young cartoon.
 Political cartoon from 1882, showing
a Chinese man being barred entry to
the “Golden Gate of Liberty”. The
caption reads “We must draw the line
somewhere, you know.”
 Published in The Wasp in
1881 captured white
Californians’ fears of Chinese
immigration and invoked a
comparison between San
Francisco and New York.
While New York welcomed
European immigrants to
America’s shores, San
Francisco feared the
disastrous effects of Chinese
immigration. As a result, a
statue of a Chinese male
coolie in San Francisco Bay
mocks New York’s Statue of
Liberty, then under
construction
“Ellis Island of
the West”
• From 1910 to 1940, San Francisco
and the Angel Island
Immigration Station served as
the entry point for over half a
million people from eighty
different countries around the
world.
• Two-thirds of the newcomers
came from China and Japan, but
there were also immigrants from
India, Korea, Russia, Mexico, the
Philippines, Germany, Spain,
Italy, Guatemala, El Salvador,
Peru, and Chile, the Pacific
Islands, Australia, and New
Zealand.
• Half a million people were
processed through Angel Island
(both arrivals and departures)
Angel Island vs. Ellis Island
 Angel Island was popularly called the “Ellis Island of the West.” However,
it was in fact very different from its counterpart in New York. Ellis Island
enforced American immigration laws that restricted, but did not exclude
European immigrants.
 Angel Island, on the other hand, was the chief port of entry for Chinese
and other immigrants from Asia, and as such, enforced immigration
policies that singled out Asians (for long detention and exclusion.)
Ellis Island
 12 million from 1891-1952
 20% of all immigrant
arrivals were detained
 Detention time was 1-2 days
 98% were admitted
Angel Island
• 500, 000 from 1910-1930
• 60% of all immigrant arrivals
were detained
• Chinese counted their
detentions time in weeks,
months, years. The longest
detention was 765 days
• 93% of Chinese were admitted
but only after lengthy legal
battles and long detentions
 Wong Chung Hong, the first to
be admitted through Angel
Island on January 25, 1910.
Case Studies
 Tom Yip Jing, Mrs. Wong, Soto Shee, and Yee Shew Ning
 Write up a response to the following questions:
Summarize their experiences on Angel Island.
2. What did you find most interesting about their personal experience?
Why?
3. What do you think about the process?
1.
Angel Island Gatekeepers – 1930s
Medical exam in
hospital – Angel
Island
Board of Special
Inquiry
interrogation, 1923
Immigration Interrogation Questions (Chinese
Applicants)
 What is your name?
 How old are you?
 What are your parents’ names? What are their ages?
 When were they married?
 Do you have any brothers or sisters? What are their names and ages?
 What is the name of your village?
 How many houses are on your street?
 Who lives in the third house on the left hand side of your street? List all
names and ages
 Who is the oldest man in your village?
 How many steps lead up to your house?
 How many windows does your house have?
 How many clocks are in your house?
 How many chickens do your neighbors own?
 How far is it from your village to the nearest hill?
 When were the windows put into your house?
 Fong Hoy Kun, who was applying for admission as a son of a native in 1918,







faced these questions:
Q: Which direction does the front of your house face?
A: Face west.
Q: Your alleged father has indicated that his house in How Chong
Village faces east.
How do you explain that?
A: I know the sun rises in the front of our house and sets in the back of
our house. My mother told me that our house and also the How Chong
Village faces west.
Q: Cannot you figure this matter out for yourself?
A: I really don't know directions...
 Q: How many rooms in all are there on the ground floor of your house?
 A:





Three; (changes) I mean there is a parlor, two bedrooms and a
kitchen. There are five rooms in all downstairs. The two bedrooms are
together, side by side, and are between the parlor and kitchen.
Q: Do you wish us to understand you would forget how many bedrooms
are in a house where you claim to have lived seventeen years?
A: Yes, I forgot about it.
Q: Did you visit the Sar Kai Market with your father when he was last in
China?
A: No.
Q: Why not, if you really are his son?
 Interior of
Chinese men’s
barracks, 1910.
Chinese made
up 70% of all
detainees.
 Between 200300 men and 3050 women were
detained in the
Angel Island
barracks at any
given time for an
average stay of
2-3 weeks.
 Law Shee Low’s wedding
 portrait in China, 1921 (detained on
Angel Island in 1922.)
 “One woman was questioned all day
and then deported. She told me they
asked her about life in China: the
chickens and the neighbors, and the
direction the house faced. How would
I know all that? I was scared.”
 Lee Puey You immigrated as
 the daughter of a U.S. citizen
 In 1939. She was detained for 20 months
while her case went up to the U.S. Supreme
Court.
 “I must have cried a bowlful of tears on
Angel island.”
Smiley Jann, detained on Angel Island
for 3 weeks in 1931.
Tet Yee, detained on Angel Island for 6 months in 1932.
Why is Angel Island Significant?
 Its history helps us answer an essential question about immigration and the
U.S.:
 Is the United States a “nation of immigrants” that welcomes newcomers and helps
them to achieve their dreams?
 Or is it a “gatekeeping nation” that builds fences and detention centers to keep out
aliens it identifies as undesirable and dangerous (and unfit to become Americans)?
 Lee/Yung: “The history of immigration through Angel Island tells us that the
United States is both. For some immigrants, American represents the chance to
remake themselves; for others, the U.S. and its opportunities remain out of
reach … Which America immigrants encounter is determined by economics,
politics, foreign relations, and often the newcomer’s race, nationality, class, and
gender.”
Angel Island Immigrants: Who Were They?
 Chinese: young, male laborers (single or married with wives and children





remaining in China); intending to be in the U.S. temporarily but gradually
deciding to settle in the U.S. over the years.
Japanese: male laborers, educated, increasing number of women as Japanese
decide to stay in the U.S. by WWII, large U.S- born second generation
South Asians: young male laborers and students interested in Indian
nationalism; a mixture of Hindus, Muslims, but mostly Sikh
Koreans: come as refugees fleeing Japanese colonialism; higher proportion of
women, children, educated, Christian
Filipinos: young male laborers, Catholic, American in outlook; come as “U.S.
nationals;” can migrate freely until 1935, but cannot vote
Russian Jews: migrating as families fleeing persecution
Angel Island today …
 What discovery led to the preservation of the Angel Island Immigration
station in the 1970s?
 1970 discovery of poems by Alexander Weiss, CA State Park Ranger on Angel
Island – “First I saw the deeply carved stuff and I said, wow! But then I
looked around and shined my flashlight up and I could see that the entire
walls were covered with calligraphy, and that was what blew me away. People
had carved this stuff on every square inch of wall space, not just in this one
room but all over.” Although Weiss could not read the writing on the walls,
he knew they were culturally and historically significant. His supervisor did
not share his opinion. Weiss was told not to bother with the “bunch of
graffiti” because the building was going to be torn down as part of the
“Master Plan.”
42.
There are tens of thousands of poems composed on these walls.
They are all cries of complaint and sadness.
The day I am rid of this prison and attain success,
I must remember that this chapter once existed.
In my daily needs, I must be frugal.
Needless extravagance leads youth to ruin.
All my compatriots should please be mindful.
Once you have some small gains, return home early.
By one from Heungshan
43.
Imprisoned in the wooden building day after day,
My freedom withheld; how can I bear to talk about it?
I look to see who is happy, but they only sit quietly.
I am anxious and depressed and cannot fall asleep.
The days are long and the bottle constantly empty; my sad mood, even so, is
not dispelled.
Nights are long and the pillow cold; who can pity my loneliness?
After experiencing such loneliness and sorrow,
Why not just return home and learn to plow the fields?
99.
I clasped hands in parting with my brothers and classmates.
Because of the mouth, I hastened to cross the American ocean.
How was I to know that the Western barbarians had lost their hearts and reason?
With a hundred kinds of oppressive laws, they mistreat us Chinese.
It is still not enough after being interrogated and investigated several times;
We also have to have our chests examined while naked.
Our countrymen suffer this treatment
All because our country’s power cannot yet expand.
If there comes a day when China will be united,
I will surely cut out the heart and bowels of the Western barbarian.
Changing Demographics
https://www.brookings.edu/book/diversity-explosion/
Any thoughts about this study?