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Huddled Masses Yearning To Breathe Free

Page history last edited by Mr. Hengsterman 2 years, 1 month ago

     
 

 

Huddled Masses Yearning To Breathe Free [1880 to 1920]
The story of mass migration to the United States is the intersection of other narratives  - farming in the
West and Industry in East.   Weakness of labor (structural factor) is largely due to a diversity of immigrants.  

The New Colossus: Emma Lazarus 

 

Introducing Sacco and Venzetti

 

Statue of Liberty

 

     

http://nerdfighteria.info/video/143/RRhjqqe750A

 

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCdXiOssbM0

 

Historical Context: As it was for earlier immigrants, those who immigrate in the post Civil War era generally are not welcomed by those whose family had already established roots in America. Asians, Eastern and Southern Europeans, and Jews often faced hostility from those who considered themselves culturally superior.


MAP: Distribution of Immigrants in the American Colonies

MAP Foreign Born Population 1890

 

CHART: A Family settles on Troy

 


The impulse to blend in is constantly competing with urge to hold on to the old world traditions and cultural patterns. 

 

Three basic questions to consider when examining immigration patters:

  1. Why did they come?
  2. Who were they?
  3. What were their lives like?

 

Most immigrants reside in cities and become much more visible as America begins to transform itself. In 1860 the United States is largely a rural country. By 1900 ½ population lives in cities.

 

BY THE NUMBERS 

1870-1890            8 million New immigrants

 

1891                       Federal law mandates health inspections 15 minutes to 4 hours


1890-1920            18.2 million  (12 million are permanent)

1900                     15% of the population are immigrants

 

 

 


Why did Immigrants come to the US during  the Gilded Age? 
 

PULL FACTORS  PUSH FACTORS 

Technology  (steam power) = cheaper travel 

 

Industrialization is major cause. Immigrants were recruited by companies to work in American factories

 

In 1869 there were 2 million factory workers;
by 
1899 that number doubled to 4.7 million

 

 


Re-migration: 25%-60% return to their home country                                                                                                    

 

 Mandated Military service

Population boom in Europe – too many farmers competing for limited land leads to internal and external migration

Development of machinery = less need for laborers on the farm

Political liberation “subjects; were not allowed to leave country;  Political upheaval and unrest

 

 

 

 

 

 

Immigrants transform what it means to be American!!!

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/03/10/us/20090310-immigration-explorer.html

 

 

 

 

 

Old Immigration (1820 to 1870) New Immigration (1870 to 1924)
Mostly Northern Europe (Ireland, Germany and England)                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

1890's most from Eastern Europe. They practice different religion (Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and Jewish) leads to tension with native Protestants.  They LOOK, ACT, and SMELL different. Immigrant Cultural Ties

 

 

 

NEW IMMIGRANTS 1890 to 1920
Settled mainly in cities near factories, not on the frontier; had difficulty assimilating. 
 

SLAVS 
(fled taxation and military service) 

4 million “Slavs”  - Term created to ID groups
Poland, Slovakia, Russia, Bulgaria  MAP SLAVS
Satellite countries with no Independent political history – part of a larger Empire

Eastern Orthodox and Cyrillic Alphabet

Unskilled and manual laborers – 47% illiteracy rate!!! 

 
ITALIANS
(fled poverty) 
 

Settle in the Northeast, Sometimes come over as whole villages -  45% rate of re-migration.  Prior to coming to the US they ID themselves from a village or a region

In the US they are now Italian and competing with other Ethnic groups;  Italians look different, talk different, and worship different 

 
JEWISH
(fled persecution)  

Very poor, but skilled
25% are tailors – remember Levi Strauss

6 % are carpenters or merchants
2% are farmers

NO INTENTION of GOING BACK!!! 
Why? Over 600 laws regulating Russian Jews. Czar Alex II initiates Pogroms (race riots/lynching)

 

 

 

http://queennubian.tumblr.com/post/13115319027/racist-xenophobic-anti-immigrant-american-art-the

 

 

 

 

 

WEST COAST IMMIGRATION
Recruited to work on the Railroad; Opium Wars and high taxes

 

Image result for anti-immigration cartoon

 

 

CHINESE                        

Come under contract to work off the cost of the journey

Conflict with American ideal of free labor

“Coolie” (kǔlì) was originally a transcription of the Hindi, and it literally means "bitterly hard (use of) strength."

 

1870 ‘The Chinese Must Go’

 

1879 - Reforms to California Constitution targeting Chinese

1882 - Chinese Exclusion Act 10 year freeze
1892 - additional 10 year freeze

1904 – permanent

 

Chinese Laundry niche

 
MEXICO 

“Porous” border

300,000 border crossings for seasonal work

 

 

 

http://websupport1.citytech.cuny.edu/Faculty/pcatapano/lectures_immigration/endofopenimmigration.09.html

 

 

 

Arrival in US (Angel Island and Ellis Island)
Traumatic experience – off the boat, long journey, treated by livestock, even their names

become Anglicized (Godfather Part II clip)

 

 

 

 

 

 


BY THE NUMBERS
 

1870-1890            8 million New immigrants

 

1891                       Federal law mandates health inspections 15 minutes to 4 hours


1890-1920            18.2 million  (12 million are permanent)

1900                     15% of the population are immigrants

 

 

 

THE IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE 
 
Viewpoints on Cultural Ties

 

Many people held opinions on how immigrants could best adjust to their new lives in America.  Some thought they should give up their own language and customs as quickly as possible; other thought they should hold onto to their heritage. Do you think that immigrant children or their parents had an easier time adjusting to life in America? WHY

 

 

On Breaking Cultural Ties:

“We wanted to be Americans so quickly that we were embarrassed if our parents couldn’t speak English. My father was reading a Polish paper and some of my friends were supposed to come to my house. I remember sticking the paper under something. We were ashamed of being foreign”

 

Louise Nagy, Polish immigrant, 1913

 

On Preserving Cultural Ties:

“ We ate the same dishes, spoke the same language, told the same stories, indulged in the same pleasures [as in Syria]…To me the colony [neighborhood] was a habitat so much like the one I left in Syria, that its home atmosphere enabled me to maintain a firm hold on life 
in the face of those many difficulties which I confronted.”

 

 

 

 

 

Immigration and Cultural Conflict in Gilded Age America [1870 to 1900]

Is America a haven for the poor and oppressed or guided by fluctuating feelings about 
race and ethnicity, and fear of foreign political and labor agitation? 

 


 

 

 

 

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