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Ellis Island: An Immigrants' Exprerience
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The Great Wave of Immigration
Between 1892 and 1930, nearly 20 million immigrants—Italians, Poles, Russians, Czechs, Jews, Irish, Slovaks, Turks—poured through Ellis Island. They came chasing land, escaping poverty, dodging political repression, or fleeing famine. Many endured brutal voyages just for a shot at a better life. Ellis Island was their first test: a gateway to America, or a dead end.
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From Oyster Beds to Immigration Hub
But the island had a long history before it became the nation’s immigration hub. First purchased in 1630 by the Dutch from the Mohegan people, it was known as Oyster Island for its rich beds. In the 1770s, owner Samuel Ellis left his name behind. Over the years it served as an ammunition depot, harbor fort, and even a pirate hanging ground.
After the British easily seized New York in the Revolution, Americans beefed up defenses. In 1808, the U.S. government bought the island, folding it into the harbor’s defense system. Following the Civil War, it sat idle until the government decided Castle Island’s immigration center was bursting at the seams. Two years and $75,000 later, Ellis Island had a new processing station—tripled in size thanks to landfill from Manhattan’s freshly dug subway tunnels.
Statue of Liberty seen from New York Harbor
Credit: Detroit Publishing Co. 1905, Library of Congress
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The Boat Ride to America
Immigration as Big Business
By 1900, immigration was a gold mine for shipping companies. A single one-way trip could net $60,000 in profit. Giants like Cunard and White Star Line (yes, the Titanic’s owners) advertised across Europe with bundle deals: passport, ship passage, medical inspection, even a train ticket to French ports like Le Havre or Cherbourg. But travel wasn’t seamless. Trains and ships rarely lined up, leaving immigrants stranded for weeks in grim “Emigrant hotels” until their ship arrived.
Before boarding, every immigrant faced scrutiny. Doctors checked for anarchists, criminals, or “lunatics.” Third-class men and boys had their hair cut short, vaccinations were handed out, and inspectors combed through scalps for lice. Clothes and luggage were steamed to kill vermin, which also ruined photographs and keepsakes—the last reminders of home. Shipping companies had good reason to be thorough: anyone denied entry to the U.S. had to be hauled back across the Atlantic at the company’s expense.
First-Class Privilege vs. Steerage Misery
If you had $90 for a first-class ticket, life wasn’t luxurious but it was decent. Private cabins, dining rooms with china and cutlery, and—best of all—access to baths. For steerage passengers, who paid $30, it was another story. Packed into the bowels of the ship, 95% of travelers endured noisy, hot, and poorly ventilated quarters right next to the ship’s steering mechanisms.
Steerage meant rows of iron bunks with straw or seaweed mattresses, shared wash buckets of cold seawater, and bathroom access for hundreds. Food was minimal, and maggots were a bonus feature. Seasick passengers vomited into the same buckets used for washing, and the stench of toilets filled the air. In 1910, President William H. Taft launched an investigation that concluded:
“The ventilation is almost always inadequate, and the air soon becomes foul. The unattended vomit of the seasick, the odors of not too clean bodies, the reek of food and the awful stench of the nearby toilet rooms make the atmosphere of the steerage such that it is a marvel that human flesh can endure it...”
The scandal forced reforms. After 1910, “steerage” was rebranded as “third class.” Six-bunk cabins replaced mass sleeping halls, and passengers even got their own dining room. The food? Still questionable. But compared to the steerage nightmare, it was progress.
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After two cramped weeks at sea, nothing compared to the sight of the Statue of Liberty rising 351 feet over New York Harbor. Her copper skin was already fading to that green patina we know today, but to immigrants on deck, she was dazzling. Some cheered, some wept, and others just stood silent, staring at the promise of America.
For most, the journey wasn’t over. First- and second-class passengers were inspected on board ship and whisked straight into New York. But steerage passengers—the overwhelming majority—were ferried to Ellis Island, where officials assumed the poor were more likely to carry disease or end up a burden on the state. The goal of Ellis Island was blunt: separate the “desirable” from the sick and unstable.
Processing could take three to five hours, and most dragged their heavy trunks with them, terrified of losing everything they owned. Two agencies ran the gauntlet: the U.S. Public Health Service and the Bureau of Immigration. Doctors perfected “six-second physicals,” leaning on railings above the crowd to spot trouble—stooped backs, limps, rashes, or anything suspicious. Collars were pulled down, hats lifted, and anyone questionable was pulled aside.
Doctors marked the unfit with chalk: B for back, E for eyes, H for heart, Sc for scalp, and the dreaded X for insanity. An X inside a circle meant there was no debate—you weren’t getting in. Most flagged immigrants ended up in the Ellis Island hospital, but about two percent were sent back at the shipping company’s expense.
The harshest test came for eye diseases like trachoma, a bacterial infection spread by dirty towels. Left untreated, it caused blindness. Suspected cases endured the dreaded buttonhook test: a simple shoe tool jammed under the eyelid to flip it inside out and check for scarring. It was painful, humiliating, and often the deciding factor in whether a family stayed together in America—or was split apart forever.
The Doctor Will See You Now
The dreaded button hook test
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Give me Your Tired and Poor...
but You can Keep the Lame and Lunatics.
“Stupid; erratic answers; wanders about the room.”
“Emotional; noisy, boisterous, low of self-control.”
These comments come from actual notes made by inspectors as they questioned immigrants to determine their character and mental fitness. As part of the inspection immigrants were asked a myriad of questions: twenty-nine to be exact. Their personal backgrounds, legal histories (taken from the ship’s manifest) all were examined and if they were found to be criminals, strikebreakers, anarchists or other “undesirables,” (after 1920 this was also extended to communists) they would be refused entry into the US. Some of the questions included, “Are you an anarchist?” and “Are you a polygamist?” The purpose of these questions was to determine your character. Were you hard working, did you have some sort of skill, or were you the trouble making sort that would end up living on the public dole? Immigrants had to prove that they could support themselves. Of course, answering that you had a job already lined up was a certain way to get deported. In 1885 the contract labor act made it illegal to import foreign workers, who often undercut American wages, leading to an outcry that immigrants were taking away American jobs.
An immigrant also had to prove that they had come to this country with at least some starter cash. All immigrants had to show that they had $25 on hand. This led to the rise of an interesting scam where, if you had gambled away your earnings on the boat, you could pay $3 to a guy who would loan you the necessary funds. Once you passed through the doors he would be waiting for you to collect his $25.
The mental competence of a person could be assessed without the need for a translator.
The picture at top is the Form Block Test. The Knox Cube Test (below) was an imitation test where, like the game Simon, a customs official would tap out a random pattern on the blocks and the immigrant would be expected to repeat it.
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Americanization
By the early 1900s, millions of immigrants had crammed into New York’s Lower East Side—just fourteen square miles packed with humanity. Up through the 1920s, 2,000 newcomers arrived daily. In nine states, at least 10% of the population was foreign-born, and over 100,000 couldn’t speak English.
The new arrivals from eastern and southern Europe looked very different from earlier immigrants from England, Ireland, and Germany. They were mostly poor farmers with little formal education. Many were Catholic or Jewish, which sparked open religious prejudice from Protestant America.
Adding fuel was the rise of eugenics, a twisted pseudo-science that ranked people by supposed intelligence and work ethic. Surprise, surprise: Western Europeans topped the chart, while Eastern and Southern Europeans landed in the middle, Asians below them, and Africans at the bottom. These “scientific” rankings gave cover to racism and the belief that certain groups were lazy, ignorant, or untrustworthy.
Meanwhile, nativists—middle- and upper-class Americans who saw cities as dirty and chaotic—blamed immigrants for destroying the “old ways.” The population of New York City exploded from 200,000 in 1830 to 3.5 million in 1900, fueled largely by immigration. By 1921, the backlash won out. President Coolidge signed the Emergency Immigration Act, later made permanent in 1924. Quotas heavily favored Western Europeans (86%), cut Eastern and Southern Europeans to 11%, and left just 2% for everyone else. Chinese immigrants had already been banned outright in 1886.
At the bottom of the ladder were the Chinese, Japanese, and Irish, funneled into the dirtiest and most dangerous jobs—mines, railroads, tanneries, and iron mills. Immigrants were cheap labor, easily swapped in as strikebreakers when workers protested. The system stoked ethnic tensions, with some of the ugliest violence breaking out between Irish laborers and Black workers, both competing for survival at the bottom of the economy.
Americanization class.
Portland, Maine. 1926
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The End of Ellis Island
Ellis Island once saw millions flood through its gates, peaking in 1907 when more than 1.25 million immigrants arrived. Between 1900 and 1915, workers struggled to keep up—expanding hospitals, dorms, and kitchens just to handle the daily crush of arrivals.
But immigration slowed after 1914. World War I closed off travel, and new restrictions hammered the flow. The Immigrant Quota Act of 1921 and the National Origins Act of 1924 set strict limits. Between 1925 and 1954, only about two million passed through Ellis Island—a dramatic fall from the 5,000–10,000 a day that arrived before the war.
The quotas were rooted in prejudice. Using old census data, the government capped groups they saw as “undesirable.” Western Europeans were favored, while Eastern and Southern Europeans were slashed to 11%. Asians fared worse—the Chinese had been banned since 1886, and the Japanese soon joined them. In 1917, Congress added a literacy test and further tightened quotas.
There was another change: by the 1920s, America had embassies around the world. Immigrants could be screened overseas and enter through any port. Ellis Island was reduced to handling refugees and paperwork problems. By 1954, the once-bustling gateway closed for good.
Today Ellis Island survives as a museum, restored in 1984 in what was then the largest preservation project in U.S. history. Forty percent of Americans can trace their family tree back to someone who passed through those doors—a reminder that for millions, Ellis Island was where the American story began.
Save Ellis Island Project
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Why it Matters
Ellis Island is more than just a patch of land in New York Harbor—it’s a powerful symbol of America’s identity as a nation of immigrants. Between 1892 and 1954, over 12 million people passed through its halls, carrying little more than hope, determination, and a few possessions. These immigrants—hailing from countries as diverse as Italy, Ireland, Germany, and Russia—shaped the cultural, economic, and social fabric of the United States. They provided the labor that built America’s cities, fueled its industrial growth, and enriched its culture with new traditions, languages, and cuisines. Immigration through Ellis Island represents one of the most dynamic periods in American history, showcasing the country’s promise of opportunity while also highlighting its struggles with prejudice and integration. Ultimately, Ellis Island and immigration remind us of the central role newcomers have played in defining what it means to be American.
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