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Three important details about Italian immigrants’ journey to the United States were, Like millions of other Italians, Pascal and his father came to the United States to escape poverty. Steerage passengers were allowed on deck only once a day. The rest of the time, they tried to amuse themselves by playing games, singing, and making music with accordions, mandolins, and other instruments. After almost two weeks, the travelers arrived at the immigration station on Ellis Island in New York Harbor, where they were required to pass medical examinations and answer questions about how they intended to support themselves in the United States.

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Three important details about Italian immigrants’ life in the United States were, Padrones helped many Italian immigrants get unskilled work building sewers, subways, and roads; cleaning streets; and laying bricks for new tenement buildings. By 1890, Italians made up 90 percent of New York's public works employees and 99 percent of Chicago's street workers. Fortunately, Italian neighborhoods also offered opportunities for fun, They strung colored lights, flags, and streamers along the shops and streets where families strolled among booths that offered food and games. Fireworks, music, and dancing reminded everyone of life back home. Because many Italian newcomers were poor and uneducated, Americans tended to look down on them. When a few Italians turned to crime and became notorious gangsters, some people started thinking of all Italians as criminals. As a group, however, Italian immigrants were generally more law-abiding than average Americans.

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What images come to mind when someone mentions Italian immigrants to the United States? If you are like most people, myself included, you imagine steamships and the early 1900s. Typically, what I envision is the iconic scene in "The Godfather, Part II." Vito Corleone, as a boy, is sitting in a room on Ellis Island looking out the window with the Statue of Liberty reflected in the glass. I believe most people think of such images, immigrants in rough homespun clothes waiting in lines to get through immigration. They are all visions of the east coast, New York harbor and Little Italy.

Since most Italians immigrated to the U.S. in the early 1900s during the Italian diaspora, it is only natural that we all think this way. Unfortunately, this gives the impression that we are new contributors to American society, latecomers to the party. The truth of the matter is that Italians have been part of our country's development since the discovery of the Americas through our nation's founding to modern times. Our country would not be what it is today if we were to remove these early Italian contributors from our history.

Of course, we could discuss the long list of Italian explorers of the new world beyond just Christopher Columbus, such as Sebastiano Caboto, Giovanni Da Verrazzano and Amerigo Vespucci. However, Italians did not just find the place and go home. We were part and parcel of establishing our nation and the principles upon which it is based. There are men such as Filippo Mazzei who is said to have inspired Jefferson to write "all men are created equal" in the Declaration of Independence. Another Italian-American, Philip Paca, Maryland's delegate to First Continental Congress, was a signator of that document. There are also men such as Louis Palma Di Cesnola who fought to preserve the Union during the Civil War and the first director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In addition to those Italians who have been remembered by history are the millions of unsung Italians and Italian Americans who helped settle our great nation. In the latter half of the 19th century, New Orleans was an important trading port. Crops such as cotton and sugar cane were exported to Europe and South America while receiving imports such as lemons and oranges from Sicily. Unfortunately for the southern plantation owners, the exports were labor-intensive, which was a real problem after the Civil War when many slaves left the plantation. The plantation owners were more than happy to replace them with Italians, who they considered as an "In-Between" race, not quite white and not quite black. The Italian presence in New Orleans grew. By the close of the 19th century, there were more than 30,000 Italian Americans in that one area. More than laborers, they had expanded their ranks to include artisans, fisherman and merchants. These in-between people started to dominate certain markets, mainly the fish, fruit and oyster markets.

In the western part of the country, Italians were there when it was still part of Mexico. As early as the 1830s, Italians who had been working off the western shores of South America began to explore the California coast. They established fishing communities in places such as Monterey and San Pedro. Soon word made it back to Italy about the richness of California, which launched a flood of settlers.

When the Italians traveled to California, they brought the crops they knew from back home; broccoli, bell peppers, eggplant, artichokes, and lemons. Most importantly, with them came the knowledge of growing grapes and the production of wine. By 1851 there were over 100 vineyards in the Los Angeles area exporting approximately 7,200 cases of wine. By 1869 that number rose to nearly four million. Through their hard work, Italians established the Southern California agricultural industry.

Although my grandparents came to this country in the early 1900s, I am proud to be part of the Italian American community. I celebrate not only what our community has done in the past 120 years, but the total contribution we have made to the greatness of the United States of America.

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The Italian Immigrant - La Gazzetta Italiana

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What images come to mind when someone mentions Italian immigrants to the United States? If you are like most people, myself included, you imagine steamships and the early 1900s. Typically, what I envision is the iconic scene in "The Godfather, Part II." Vito Corleone, as a boy, is sitting in a room...

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Three important details about Jewish immigrants’ journey to the United States were, Like most European immigrants, the Antins entered the United States through New York Harbor. Wealthier passengers in first-class and second-class cabins were questioned briefly before being admitted to their new country, but the majority of arrivals were taken on crowded barges to the immigration station on Ellis Island. Often immigrants were forced to wait for hours while inspectors and doctors examined each person.After long rides in overcrowded trains and weeks of delay, her family finally boarded a ship in Hamburg, Germany. Whereas richer immigrants enjoyed comfortable cabins, the Antins were crowded together with hundreds of other passengers deep down in the ship. Mary's father left for the United States in 1891, like many others, hoping to earn enough money to send for his family. Many Jews fled from persecution, hoping to find refuge in the United States. Between 1881 and 1924, some 2.4 million Jews came to the United States from Russia and other countries in eastern Europe.

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Three important details about Jewish immigrants’ life in the United States were, From Ellis Island, Jews often headed for New York City's Lower East Side neighborhood. There they established shops, newspapers, religious schools, and synagogues, also known as community centers. Some Jews worked as street vendors, using pushcarts to sell everything from coal to secondhand clothes. Pushcart vendors saved their money to buy horsedrawn carts and eventually small stores. Parents who made a little money often sent their sons, and sometimes their daughters, to the city's inexpensive public colleges. By 1910, more Jewish youths over the age of 16 were still in school than were young people of any other ethnic group.Like other immigrant groups, Jews faced prejudice and discrimination. Most private schools and clubs refused to accept Jews. Hospitals refused to hire Jewish doctors, and the New York Bar Association would not admit Jews as lawyers. Many ads for jobs stated simply, “Christians only.”

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Like many of the Chinese, Lee paid 50 dollars for a bunk on a crowded steamship to make the month-long voyage to San Francisco, California. On the ship, he got his first taste of foreign food and marveled at machinery he had never seen before. The first Chinese immigrants came to the United States to seek gold in California. Later, many helped to build the country's first transcontinental railroad. Before being allowed to leave Angel Island and officially enter the United States, each immigrant was required to answer detailed questions from officials. “How many steps are there in your house?” “Where do you sleep in your house?” “Who lives next door?” Then they asked a “family” witness from San Francisco the same questions, and if the answers did not match, officials could deport the newcomer. These “paper relatives” landed at Angel Island in San Francisco Bay. Government immigration officials “locked us up like criminals in compartments like the cages in zoos,” said one Chinese immigrant.

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Three important details about Chinese immigrants’ life in the United States are, When Lee Chew arrived in San Francisco, he worked first as a servant and then established his own laundry. Many Chinese started laundries because, as Lee explained, “It requires little capital and is one of the few opportunities that are open. Like Lee, most Chinese settled in city neighborhoods like San Francisco's bustling Chinatown, where they could find work at Chinese laundries, restaurants, and stores. Chinese newspapers, herbal medicines, foods, and festivals provided familiarity, comfort, and support.

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Nativism began to rise in the 1880s because, yet time and again nativism has sparked actions and policies directed against newer arrivals. While nativism is sometimes rooted in economic competition, other times it stems from ethnic, religious, and other differences. In the 1830s, for example, Protestant nativists charged that Catholic immigrants were enemies of democracy because they feared that Catholics had more loyalty to the pope in Rome. The surge in immigration that began in the 1880s fueled another rise in nativism. Some native-born Americans blamed immigrants for everything from slums and crime to hard times and competition for jobs, which prompted many labor leaders to discriminate against people who were not white.

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Congress responded to the surge in nativism by, Politicians responded to the growing prejudice against immigrants. As you have read, in 1882 Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, banning further immigration by Chinese laborers. In 1907, Japanese immigrants were forbidden entry to the United States. In 1917, Congress required immigrants to prove they could read and write in at least one language before they were allowed to enter the United States. To further limit immigration, Congress established a quota system in 1921 and refined it in 1924. Under this system, by 1927 only 150,000 immigrants were allowed to enter the United States annually, and people from East Asia were completely excluded. The new laws did not restrict Mexican immigration, but Mexicans now needed passports and visas to enter the United States. Visas allow people from other nations to enter and stay in the United States for a limited period.