New Waves of Immigration: Ellis Island & Angel Island: Fifth Grade Social Studies
Between 1880 and 1920, more than twenty-five million immigrants arrived on American shores in the greatest mass human migration in world history, entering through historic gateways on the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
The Shift to "New Immigration" (1880-1920)
Prior to 1880, the majority of immigrants coming to the United States were part of the "Old Immigration" wave—originating primarily from Northern and Western Europe (Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, and Scandinavia). Most were English-speaking or shared similar cultural and religious traditions.
Starting in the 1880s, the demographic pattern shifted dramatically toward what historians call "New Immigration."
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| OLD IMMIGRATION vs. NEW IMMIGRATION |
| |
| FEATURE OLD IMMIGRANTS (Pre-1880) NEW IMMIGRANTS (1880-1920)|
| --------------- ----------------------- ----------------------|
| Regions of Origin Northern & Western Southern & Eastern |
| Europe (Britain, Ireland, Europe (Italy, Poland,|
| Germany, Norway) Russia, Greece, Austria)|
| and Asia (China, Japan)|
| |
| Languages English, German, Gaelic Italian, Polish, |
| Russian, Yiddish, |
| Greek, Cantonese |
| |
| Religions Mostly Protestant Roman Catholic, |
| (except Irish Catholics) Eastern Orthodox, |
| and Jewish |
| |
| Financial Status Often had modest savings; Arrived impoverished; |
| many bought farms took low-wage factory |
| and manual labor jobs |
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Millions of newcomers fled severe hardships in Europe:
- Southern Italians: Escaped crushing agricultural poverty, malaria, high taxes, and earthquakes in southern Italy and Sicily.
- Eastern European Jews: Fled violent religious persecution, massacres, and government-sponsored mob violence called pogroms across the Russian Empire, where laws restricted Jews to the "Pale of Settlement" and barred them from owning land.
- Poles, Greeks, and Slavs: Sought escape from political oppression under vast multi-ethnic empires (the Austro-Hungarian, Russian, and Ottoman empires) and military conscription.
New immigrants were attracted to the United States by the promise of jobs in booming American industries: coal mines in Pennsylvania, steel mills in Pittsburgh, meatpacking plants in Chicago, and garment sweatshops in New York City.
The Atlantic Gateway: Ellis Island (1892-1954)
Before 1892, individual states processed immigrants at local depots like Castle Garden in Manhattan. Recognizing that immigration was a federal responsibility, the federal government opened Ellis Island on January 1, 1892, in New York Harbor, in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty.
Over its sixty-two years of operation, Ellis Island processed more than twelve million immigrants. The very first immigrant processed was Annie Moore, a courageous fifteen-year-old girl from County Cork, Ireland, who arrived with her two younger brothers to reunite with their parents.
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| THE IMMIGRANT JOURNEY THROUGH ELLIS ISLAND |
| |
| 1. THE STEAMSHIP VOYAGE: |
| - 10 to 14 days crammed in the damp, dark, airless steerage|
| decks below water; sleeping on narrow bunks. |
| | |
| v |
| 2. THE BAGGAGE ROOM: |
| - Arriving immigrants drop their heavy wicker baskets, |
| trunks, and bundles of worldly possessions. |
| | |
| v |
| 3. THE "SIX-SECOND MEDICAL INSPECTION": |
| - Doctors watch immigrants climb the stairs; look for |
| limping, wheezing, or heart trouble. |
| - U.S. Public Health Service doctors flip eyelids with a |
| buttonhook to check for TRACHOMA (contagious blindness). |
| - Chalk marks placed on coats: |
| H = Heart | X = Mental Defect | E = Eyes | L = Lame|
| | |
| v |
| 4. THE GREAT HALL (REGISTRY ROOM): |
| - Thousands seated on wooden benches; called to legal |
| inspectors' desks to answer 29 background questions |
| (Name, age, destination, criminal record, job prospects).|
| | |
| v |
| 5. THE "STAIRS OF SEPARATION": |
| - Left staircase: Ferry to New York City. |
| - Right staircase: Railroad tickets to the interior U.S. |
| - Center staircase: Detention or DEPORTATION! |
| (Only roughly 2% of immigrants were rejected!). |
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The Inspection Process: Hope and Heartbreak
Most immigrants traveled in "steerage"—the lowest deck of the steamship, located beneath the waterline, where hundreds of passengers slept in stacked iron bunk beds in crowded, nauseating conditions without fresh air or privacy.
Upon arriving in New York Harbor, first- and second-class passengers were inspected briefly on board and permitted to disembark directly into Manhattan. Steerage passengers were transferred by barges to Ellis Island.
The inspection process was designed to screen out anyone with contagious diseases, criminal records, or mental disabilities who might become a "public charge" dependent upon government welfare:
- Medical Inspections: As immigrants climbed the grand staircase to the Registry Room, sharp-eyed doctors conducted a "six-second physical," watching for shortness of breath, limping, or signs of illness. Doctors used a blunt metal buttonhook to lift and flip back each immigrant's eyelids to check for trachoma, an incurable, contagious eye infection that caused blindness. Immigrants suspected of having health issues were marked with white chalk on their lapels and sent to isolation wards.
- Legal Registry: Immigrants who cleared the medical exams sat in long rows of wooden benches in the cavernous Registry Room. Federal inspectors sat at tall desks with massive ship manifests, questioning each person through interpreters: What is your name? Can you read and write? Do you have a job waiting for you (which was illegal under federal contract labor laws)? Do you have any money?
- The "Stairs of Separation": Following inspection, immigrants walked down a central three-way staircase. Those heading to Manhattan took the left stairs to the ferryboat; those heading west to Chicago or Cleveland took the right stairs to the railroad ticket office; those held for further medical examination or detention were taken down the center stairs.
Contrary to popular belief, Ellis Island was not a place of mass rejection: roughly ninety-eight percent of all immigrants passed inspection and were granted entry into the United States, typically within three to five hours. For millions, Ellis Island was the "Isle of Hope." But for the two percent who were rejected and forced onto ships back to Europe—often tearing children away from parents—it was the tragic "Isle of Tears."
The Pacific Gateway: Angel Island (1910-1940)
While Ellis Island in New York was designed to facilitate and welcome European immigration, the immigration station at Angel Island in San Francisco Bay was established for the exact opposite purpose: to enforce exclusionary laws and prevent Asian immigrants from entering the country.
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| THE CHINESE EXCLUSION ACT (1882) |
| |
| - THE FIRST FEDERAL LAW IN U.S. HISTORY TO PROHIBIT AN ENTIRE |
| NATIONAL OR ETHNIC GROUP FROM IMMIGRATING TO AMERICA! |
| - Banned Chinese laborers from entering the country for 10 |
| years (renewed repeatedly until repealed in 1943!). |
| - Denied Chinese residents the right to become naturalized |
| U.S. citizens. |
| - ONLY EXCEPTIONS: Merchants, diplomats, teachers, & students.|
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Following the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad and the severe economic depression of the 1870s, anti-Chinese hostility erupted in California. White workingmen's unions, led by agitator Denis Kearney, blamed Chinese immigrants for lowering wages, adopting the racist rallying cry: "The Chinese Must Go!"
In 1882, Congress bowed to political pressure by passing the landmark Chinese Exclusion Act. It prohibited all Chinese laborers from immigrating to the United States and barred Chinese residents from ever becoming naturalized citizens.
Angel Island: The "Guardian of the Western Gate"
In 1910, the federal government opened an immigration station on Angel Island, an isolated island in the foggy waters of San Francisco Bay. Over thirty years, an estimated one hundred and seventy-five thousand Chinese and other Asian immigrants were processed there.
Unlike Ellis Island, where processing took hours, Asian immigrants arriving at Angel Island were treated like criminal prisoners. Men and women were immediately separated and locked inside crowded, drafty, disease-ridden wooden barracks behind wire fences guarded by armed guards.
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| THE AGONY OF DETENTION ON ANGEL ISLAND |
| |
| DURATION OF DETENTION: |
| - Immigrants were detained for WEEKS, MONTHS, OR EVEN YEARS! |
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| v |
| "PAPER SONS AND DAUGHTERS": |
| - In 1906, the San Francisco earthquake and fire destroyed all|
| city birth and immigration records! |
| - Chinese residents claimed they were native-born citizens. |
| - Sola legal "slots" to relatives in China: "Paper Sons." |
| | |
| v |
| EXHAUSTING INTERROGATIONS: |
| - Inspectors questioned applicants for days on petty details: |
| "How many steps lead to your house? What direction does |
| your front door face? Which bed does your grandmother sleep|
| in?" Discrepancies meant IMMEDIATE DEPORTATION! |
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To bypass the Chinese Exclusion Act, many immigrants purchased forged identity papers claiming they were the sons or daughters of Chinese Americans whose citizenship had been established when the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire destroyed all city municipal birth records. These immigrants were known as "paper sons" and "paper daughters."
Federal inspectors subjected applicants to grueling, hostile interrogations that lasted for days, asking obscure questions about their ancestral villages: How many houses were in your third row? Who lived in the fourth house? Where was the village water well? If the applicant's answers failed to match the testimony of their alleged father down to the smallest detail, the applicant was denied entry and deported.
Poetry on the Walls
Trapped in agonizing confinement with no knowledge of when they would be released, Chinese detainees channeled their loneliness, sorrow, and outrage into art. Using knives and ink brushes, they carved more than two hundred magnificent, classical Chinese poems directly into the soft wooden walls of the detention barracks.
One anonymous poem reads: "Detained in this wooden house for several tens of days, It is all because of the Mexican exclusion law which torments us. Even if it is said that I've reached America, When will I ever be allowed to go ashore?"
Another reads: "From now on, I am departing from this building, All my sorrows of a hundred kinds have been cleared away. Do not say that everything is smooth sailing for the voyager, There are many hardships in the human world."
Today, these preserved barracks stand as a National Historic Landmark, honoring the endurance and resilience of Asian pioneers who helped build modern America.
Building Modern America: Ethnic Neighborhoods and Labor
Immigrants who successfully cleared Ellis Island and Angel Island became the muscle and heart of the booming American economy. They built the skyscrapers of Chicago, laid the subway tunnels of New York, harvested the sugar beets of Colorado, and sewed the garments of the fashion industry.
In major cities, newcomers settled in dense, vibrant ethnic enclaves—neighborhoods like Little Italy, Chinatown, the Lower East Side Jewish quarter, and Polish neighborhoods in Chicago. In these self-contained communities, immigrants found comfort in a bewildering new country: they could speak their native language, buy familiar foods, worship in traditional churches and synagogues, read foreign-language newspapers, and receive support from mutual aid societies (landsmanhaften).
Through their relentless work ethic, cultural traditions, and sacrifices, generations of immigrants wove their heritage into the fabric of American democracy, transforming the United States into a dynamic, diverse, and enduring multicultural nation.
Chapter Review and Exercises
Summary Review Exercises
Exercise One asks students to contrast the characteristics of "Old Immigration" (prior to 1880) with "New Immigration" (1880-1920), detailing regions of origin, native languages, religious faiths, and economic occupations. The response should contrast the predominantly Northern and Western European, English- and German-speaking, Protestant immigrants of the earlier wave with the Southern and Eastern European (Italian, Polish, Russian Jewish) and Asian immigrants of the later wave who spoke diverse languages, practiced Catholicism, Judaism, or Orthodoxy, and worked primarily in low-wage industrial factories.
Exercise Two asks students to describe the immigrant inspection experience at Ellis Island in New York Harbor, detailing the medical screenings, the legal examinations in the Registry Room, and the significance of the "Stairs of Separation." The response should explain the "six-second medical check" using buttonhooks for trachoma, the chalk-marking system, the twenty-nine manifest questions asked by legal inspectors, and the three stairways leading to New York ferries, western railroad connections, or deportation.
Exercise Three requires students to contrast the purpose and experience of Angel Island in San Francisco Bay with Ellis Island, analyzing the impact of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the phenomenon of "paper sons." The response should explain that Angel Island was an exclusionary detention center designed to enforce the Chinese Exclusion Act through hostile interrogations lasting weeks or months, detailing how the 1906 San Francisco earthquake allowed immigrants to buy forged papers and recount the poetry carved into the wooden barrack walls.
Detailed Solutions
Solution to Exercise One clarifies that the demographic shift of 1880 transformed the American social landscape. The arrival of millions of Southern and Eastern Europeans brought new cultural, linguistic, and religious diversity to the nation, providing the industrial labor force that powered America's Second Industrial Revolution while triggering renewed nativist resistance.
Solution to Exercise Two reveals that Ellis Island was designed as a high-volume federal processing depot. While the vast majority of applicants passed inspection within hours, the medical and legal screening was an intense psychological ordeal where the fear of quarantine, chalk marks, or family separation hung over every arriving family.
Solution to Exercise Three details that Angel Island represented a deliberate policy of racial exclusion. Unlike Ellis Island's welcoming orientation, Angel Island operated as an immigration prison where anti-Asian prejudice resulted in prolonged confinement, invasive interrogations, and systemic discrimination, leaving behind profound poetic expressions of grief and resistance carved into the barracks.