Ellis Island was active from 1892-1954, processed 12 million immigrants, and was created because they needed a place to process (and hold) the vast amounts of people coming into the country. This is the registry room where people started the inspection process. Sometimes as many as 5,000 people were processed per day.
Visiting Ellis Island was simultaneously heavy and fascinating. On the one hand, the museum had extensive information on the flow of immigrants–where they came from, why they left their home country, and where they ended up–and on the other hand, the museum outlined Ellis Island’s traumatic processing system as well as the fact that from the 17th century to the early 19th century, more than half of the people who arrived came against their wills. More than half. The abduction of people from Africa for the slave trade was (by far, the museum sign said) the largest forced migration in human history.
The island’s main building. After the registry room, immigrants went through a series of small rooms for health checks, mental competency checks, and legal checks. There was this haunting photo of a group of men who had “X” chalked onto their lapels–they’d been marked as insane or mentally deficient. They looked more afraid than anything else.
Getting off the boat! We headed to the cafe first. They modeled the dining room on the original eating hall.
The museum also had this cool section about things people brought with them when they migrated. They worked with descendants of immigrants to find the items and get the stories behind them.
This part of the museum had graphs showing immigration data as well as excerpts from letters to set historical context. I meant to sort of skim it, but it was so interested that I ended up reading everything.
The grounds were lovely. I wondered if detainees got to wander the grounds. (Some people were on the island for months if they needed medical treatment or to stay with a family member who was getting medical treatment.)
Heading back to Manhattan.
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