Social and economic hardships in Europe transformed late 19th-century America. Poverty unsettled millions of peasants and villagers across southern and eastern Europe, while deprivation and violence in the Russian Empire and Romania led many Jews to seek refuge in America. The result was the “new immigration,” which added to America’s existing population mix dominated by Protestant Northern Europeans, Catholic Irish and Germans, and German Jews.
The new arrivals remade and redefined the country’s life as dramatically as Irish and Germans had a half-century earlier. Italians, Yiddish-speaking Jews, and others transformed the urban economy and cultural landscape. They provided new labor to run the expanding city, working in the construction industry and mass transit, flocking into the booming garment-making industry, and opening thousands of small shops that provided food, clothing, and other necessities to their fellow newcomers.
At the end of October in New York, the weather was unexpectedly pleasant, a fortunate surprise for us. The gusts of wind did not pose any inconvenience. My son, accompanied by his wife, drove us to Liberty Park in New Jersey. The park offers ample parking at a very reasonable fee. Additionally, there are alternative routes in New York that provide access to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty, including one from Battery Park.
Our itinerary was to cover Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty in one full day. We embarked on the small boat after taking the tickets of $25 each at Liberty Park. There is a separate entry fee at Ellis Island Museum.
The exhibits in this wing describe step-by-step what most new arrivals experienced on Ellis Island, the federal government’s first immigrant inspection depot. Ellis Island’s main function was to screen out those considered undesirable—the incurably ill, the impoverished, the disabled, criminals, and all the others barred by the immigration laws of the United States.
1- At Quarantine in Lower New York Bay, doctors checked passengers for epidemic diseases. Those with typhus, yellow fever, and smallpox were placed in isolation in a hospital on Swinburne Island. Passengers exposed to such diseases were taken to Hoffman Island for observation.
Hoffman Island or Swinburne Island
2- Immigration officials boarded the steamship and inspected all first- and second-class passengers as the ship steamed through the Narrows towards the Hudson River piers.
3- After the ship docked, travelers who had passed inspection disembarked. All other newcomers were transferred to ferries and taken to Ellis Island.
4- Ferries arrived at Ellis Island, where newcomers underwent medical and legal examinations to gain admission to the United States.
For the vast majority of immigrants, Ellis Island meant three to five hours of waiting for a brief. Ships dropped anchor outside the Narrows, where quarantine station officers would come aboard to check for signs of epidemic diseases. If a ship was free of disease, doctors would then examine the first- and second-class passengers, most of whom received permission to land as soon as the ship docked. After passing through U.S. Customs at the pier, steerage passengers were ferried to Ellis Island for inspection, medical and legal examination prior to admittance.
For others, it meant a longer stay with additional testing or a legal hearing. For an unfortunate 2%, it meant exclusion and a return trip to the homeland.
During Ellis Island’s busiest years, this wing contained legal hearing rooms, waiting rooms for witnesses, detention quarters, and staff offices. The wing has been carefully restored to its appearance during the period 1918 to 1924.
When disembarking at Ellis Island, some immigrants were so encumbered with large bundles that they kept their health certificates handy by clenching them between their teeth. The assortment of baggage contained what must have been their most prized but portable belongings: clothing, feather beds, and dinnerware, as well as photographs, family prayer books, and other mementos of the homeland.
There were three types of immigration inspectors on Ellis Island. Boarding inspectors transported steerage passengers and first- and second-class detainees from steamships to Ellis Island for processing. Registry inspectors questioned arriving immigrants to determine their eligibility to land. If there was any doubt, Special Inquiry inspectors formed boards to investigate individual cases and determine whether an immigrant should be admitted or not.
Dr. Knox created visual comparisons to test illiterates suspected of being mentally deficient. In the top test, immigrants had to discover the four happy faces, and in the other two tests they had to pair up the identical images. The time factor suggested by Dr. Knox for the “leaf-cluster” test was 28 seconds; for the “envelope,” 18 seconds; and for the “happy or sad” faces, 20 seconds.
The Ellis Island hospital, staffed with 40 doctors, dealt with every kind of medical impairment, from slight injuries to rare tropical diseases. One observer said, “It is at once a maternity ward and an insane asylum.” By 1911, more than 15 buildings on the island were devoted to medical care. The U.S. Public Health Service operated a 275-bed hospital and contagious disease wards with a total of 450 beds. There was a psychiatric ward, laboratories, operating rooms, an X-ray plant, and a morgue.
A private restaurant concession operated Ellis Island’s dining room. Its costs were charged to the steamship companies, which were required by law to provide food for former passengers who had been detained. Hundreds of people from many diverse cultures were served three meals a day in the large, tiled dining room. According to most contemporary observers, the meals were plain but wholesome. Though boiled beef, stewed prunes, and baked beans were the restaurant’s staples, many immigrants also remember eating American favorites such as ice cream, bananas, and white bread.
Ellis Island had a dual reputation among immigrant groups. The anxiety over inspection and detention often caused emotional scenes—a chaotic mixture of fright and despair giving way to joy and relief. For the 98% who were permitted to land in the United States, Ellis Island was an Isle of Hope. Many families were reunited here after having been separated for years. The place in the main building where immigrants first saw their American relatives and friends well deserved its epithet, “The Kissing Post of America.”
For the unfortunate 2% of the arrivals who were excluded and sent back to their points of embargation, Ellis Island was a bitter Isle of Tears. Though 2% may sound insignificant, sometimes it translates into over 1,000 exclusions a month.
The visit to this museum took about three hours and we caught the connecting boat for the Statue of Liberty, which was about 20 minutes sail from this island.
Epilogue
A visit to the Ellis Island Museum, with approximately three hours dedicated to exploring its exhibits, is invaluable for understanding the historical development of America. It is important to acknowledge that the indigenous populations were largely decimated by British, Dutch, French, and Spanish settlers. However, in 1776, following America’s independence, Lincoln and Washington established the foundational principles of a new America, one that aspired to be free of slavery.
Subsequently, a new wave of carefully selected immigrants from around the world, particularly from Europe and a few Asian nations, contributed significantly to the advancement of America’s infrastructure, elevating it to unprecedented levels. The treatment of the host America, overall, was both kind and warranted, oscillating between the island of hope and the island of sorrow.
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