The Great Migration

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The Great Migration

• Largest Mass Movement in Human History
• From 1880 to 1921, 23 million immigrants arrived
  on Americas shores
• 56 of all immigrants across the world came to
  America
• Many came from Southern and Eastern Europe
• Italians, Russian Jews, Slavics, Poles, Russians,
  Slovaks, Bulgarians, Greeks, Portuguese
• Chinese and Japanese
• Demographics of Immigrants after 1880
• typical immigrant was young male, Catholic or
  Jewish who spoke no English
• Once I thought to write a history of the
  immigrants of America. Then I discovered that
  the immigrants were American History. Oscar
  Handlin

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Push and Pull Factors

• Economic Decline in Europe
• Industrial Revolution in Europe put many farmers
  out of business
• Higher birthrates and lower death caused
  overcrowding
• Political and Religious Persecution in Eastern
  Europe
• Strong Governments in Europe limited Religious
  rights
• Lure of Life in America
• Myths of America
• magic land of unlimited opportunity and riches
• Gold on the sidewalk all you have to do is pick
  it up
• American Factories sent representatives overseas
  to look for cheap labor
• Pamphlets that promised a better life
• Leaving the homeland
• 65 - 100 Per ticket on a steamship
• Some bribed their way out
• Czechoslovakian immigrant walked one month to
  German port
• Often left their family behind

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Journey Across the Atlantic

• Steamship Accommodations
• 1,200 to 2,000 people and it took 8-14 days
• Stayed in Steerage under front deck, no windows,
  surrounded by Steel hull of ship
• Few toilets 147 or 11,000 passengers
• Living Conditions in Steerage
• Almost no food
• Slept on straw-stuffed mattresses which got
  thrown away at end of voyage
• Disease spread rapidly

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Arrival in America

• Arriving in America
• From 1892 to early 1920s, 75 percent of all
  immigrants were processed through Ellis Island
• Passed by Statue of Liberty
• Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled
  masses yearning to breath free, the wretched
  refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the
  homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp
  beside the golden door

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Medical Inspections

• First and Second Class Inspections
• Medical inspector boarded the ship to check for
  life-threatening diseases
• First and Second class passengers were let go and
  free to start life in America
• Steerage passengers boarded a boat that went to
  Ellis Island
• Arriving At Ellis Island
• Assigned a number that was pinned on their
  clothes
• Interpreters shouted numbers to create groups of
  30 for processing
• Medical Inspections
• Wanted to weed out immigrants who would need
  public assistance
• Observers watched immigrants walking up set of
  stairs into Great Hall
• Looking for limps or disabilities
• exam took 45 minutes per immigrant
• looking for mental or medical defects

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Legal Inspections

• The Registry Hall (200 feet long, 100 feet wide)
• Final Inspection
• Could hold up to 5,000 people
• Iron railings to keep immigrants in order
• Inspectors asked questions to immigrants, judging
  truth
• The Final Inspection
• Immigrants were asked 32 questions about their
  reason for entering the U.S.
• What is your name? Married? Do you have money?
  Relatives?
• This is the place where immigrants last names
  were often changed.
• Kapelovich to Kaplowitz
• Ellis Island was not a fun place for immigrants
• Why should I fear the fires of hell? I have been
  through Ellis Island.
• Some fathers were asked to return to Europe while
  their family was allowed to stay
• Only 20 percent of immigrants were detained, 2
  percent were sent home

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Living Conditions

• City Tenement Buildings
• Five cents a spot lodging
• Cities were not ready to house a growing
  population
• Sewage often backed up
• Streets were dirty
• Tenement houses were crowed apartment buildings
• 1,231 people living in 120 rooms
• 2-3 people per bed
• Perils of Tenement Living
• Two rooms, toilets were the yard, stove for heat
  and not bathtub
• Fires, disease, death were common in immigrant
  tenement communities
• 60 of immigrant babies died before their first
  birthday
• Rural Living Conditions
• If immigrants had money they traveled west or
  south
• Italians established vineyards in California
• Polish immigrants moved to the Midwest
• B/c they moved to the country, living conditions
  were cleaner, but money was tighter

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Working Conditions

• Young Girl working in a textile factory
• Immigrant Workforce
• Majority of immigrants worked in industrial jobs
• Desperate for work and willing to accept almost
  any kind of job
• Cheap labor
• Unskilled or semiskilled laborers
• Company could teach them what they needed to know
• They did not need previous knowledge to work a
  job
• Working Conditions
• 16 a week would be sufficient to achieve a
  minimum standard of living
• Immigrants made between 1.25 and 4 a WEEK!
• 10 cents per hour
• Children made half that
• 108 hour work week
• Factories were dirty and dusty
• Improved Standard of living
• Even through they were poor, they still made more
  than they would have in Europe

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Americans Treatment

• Cartoon shows the shadow of immigrant origins
  looming over five wealthy Americans who are
  greeting a newly arrived immigrant
• American Nativism
• Americans believed immigrants posted a threat to
  them
• Prejudices based on race/ethnicity
• The immigrants are an invasion of venomous
  reptiles.. long-haired, wild-eyed, bad-smelling,
  atheistic, reckless foreign wretches, who never
  did a days work in their lives.?
• immigrants take jobs away from real Americans
• wanted number of immigrants entering U.S.
  restricted

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Ethnic Enclaves

• Crowded street in Italian neighborhood in NYC
• 1.1G Ethnic Enclaves
• Crowded street in Italian neighborhood in NYC
• Leaving Ellis Island
• Visit money exchange office and plan final
  destination
• 2/3 of immigrants went to NYC
• Ethnic Enclaves
• Most immigrants settled in Urban centers
• Boston, NYC, Chicago, Philadelphia
• Many immigrants moved in with family already
  living in U.S.
• Created sense of community (China town, Little
  Italy)
• Common food, language
• newspapers in native language
• grocery with familiar foods
• businesses that catered to native traditions