The Rising Tide of Immigration:

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The Rising Tide of Immigration

• U.S. Immigration 1870-1920

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The Great Migration 1880
3
The Great Migration
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The Great Migration

• The Largest Mass Movement in Human History.
• From 1880 to 1910, a record setting 23 million
  immigrants arrived in America.
• At this time the U.S. had no quotas or
  restrictions (limits) on how many immigrants
  entered the U.S.
• From 1880 to 1921 approximately 70 of all
  immigrants came from Southern and Eastern Europe.
• The typical Immigrant was young, male, and either
  Catholic or Jewish.
• The majority were agricultural laborers with
  little money or education.

5
Push Factors

• Reasons Pushing immigrants to leave their
  homelands.
• Agricultural Decline in Europe
• Political Religious Persecution in Eastern
  Europe
• Groups who came included, Jews from Russia,
  Greeks from Romania, Turks from Bulgaria, Poles
  living under Russian and Austrian-Hungarian rule.

6
Pull Factors

• Reasons pulling immigrants toward U.S.
• Newspaper Articles and Letters sent from family
  members painted U.S. as a Magic land.
• American businesses factories sent recrutiers
  abroad in search of cheap labor.
• Railroads Steamship companies solicited
  immigrants businesses by distributing pamphlets
  that promised a better life in US
• Immigrants faced Hardships as they traveled to
  the US

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Steerage Class, USS Permland
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The Journey Across the Atlantic

• Steamships Accommodations
• Trip lasted 8 to 14 days, with approximately
  1,200 to 2,000 people on Board
• Most Immigrants traveled in Steerage class.
• ARRIVAL IN AMERICA
• 1st 2nd class passangers were questioned aboard
  ship and released
• 3rd class passengers went to Ellis Island

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ELLIS ISLAND

• Medical Inspections
• Sought to weed out undesirables
• The Great Hall
• Part of the Registry Hall, officals preformed a
  six second exam while immigrants climbed the
  stairs.
• Given an inspection card at top of stairs.
• Medical Exams lasted about 45 Minutes
• If the doctor found anything wrong the immigrant
  was marked for further inspection

10
Legal Inspections

• The Registry Hall
• Wait was 2 to 3 hours long, sometimes as long as
  a day
• Legal Inspection
• Lasted 2 to 3 minutes,
• Only about 2 were deported

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Ethnic Enclaves
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Ethnic Enclaves

• Before Leaving Ellis Island many immigrants first
  visited the money exchange office, post office,
  and Railway room.
• 2/3 of Immigrants left Ellis Island for Cities
  other than NYC.
• About 75 of immigrants settled in urban centers
  such as Boston, New York City, Chicago,
  Philadelphia.
• Ethnic Enclaves provided immigrants with a sense
  of home
• They included newspapers in native languages,
  grocery stores with familiar foods, people in
  native dress, and churches who were filled with
  people from the home country. They strengthened
  Community and Economic ties.

13
Living Conditions
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Living Conditions

• City Tenement Buildings
• Most Tenements were run down, low rent apartment
  buildings clustered together in the poorest parts
  of town.
• Tenements had six or seven floors which contained
  four four-room apartments
• Overcrowding
• www.tenement.org

15
Working conditions
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Working Conditions

• The Immigrant Workforce
• Majority worked in industrial jobs
• Rapidly growing industries needed workers
• Immigrants did not want to work in Agriculture
• Immigrants unskilled or semiskilled
• Working Conditions
• Immigrants were vulnerable to exploitation
• Average salary was 10 cents an hour (16 dollars
  a week needed to live)
• Improved Standard of Living
• Most immigrants better off economically than they
  had been in Europe.

17
American Treatment of Immigrants
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American Nativism

• Both Native-born assimilated immigrants viewed
  newcomers with fear, hostility, and suspicion.
• Based on a belief that immigrants posed a threat
  to native-born Americans and their way of life.
• Nativists often held deep-seeded prejudices about
  immigrants based on their ethnicity, race,
  religion, political and social beliefs

19
Restrictions on Immigration

• Literacy Test
• Called for a restriction on the number of
  immigrants entering the U.S.
• In 1921, congress passed the Dillingham Bill,
  which established quotas on the number of
  immigrants entering the U.S. and ended the U.S.
  open-door policy on immigration.