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Home Annie: Rethinking Ellis Island and Annie Moore in the Classroom Mia Mercurio Social Education 72(4), pp 203–206, 188 ©2008 National Council for the Social Studies Welcome Home Annie: Rethinking Ellis Island and Annie Moore in the Classroom Mia Mercurio Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore; Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door! —Emma Lazarus (1883)1 he story of the United States and the people who have made it their home would ulated receiving station arose from not be complete without considering the experience of Irish immigrants— abuses immigrants encountered when Tparticularly the experience of Annie Moore, the first immigrant to be processed they landed in Manhattan: swindlers on Ellis Island. However, the story of Annie Moore, and how it has been recounted accosted immigrants with offers of food, and taught to date, is inaccurate. This article focuses on the past inaccuracy and offers housing, trinkets, and railway tickets, or guidance on how Annie Moore’s story should be taught, given the new information initiating exchanges by taking money that has surfaced about her life. but delivering no (or inferior) goods.3 Problems Faced by Social for a new life. Many stories of immigra- Ellis Island Studies Teachers tion, such as the story of Annie Moore, In 1890, New York City commissioners How social studies teachers decide what have been romanticized over the years were notified that the federal government to teach involves reflecting on and resolv- and in the process some have become would assume responsibility for immi- ing several pedagogical problems, two of untrue. The immigrants of that time gration. The property known as Ellis which will be emphasized in this article. came as America was undergoing a major Island was chosen as the new location. Social studies teachers must endeavor transformation—from a rural to an urban Over the course of 20 months, it was to: society—with unprecedented prosperity enlarged, the channel dredged, docks • “Get it right” by assessing official for some, due to a huge growth in indus- built, and wooden buildings constructed. and unofficial versions of history try. The need for millions of laborers It formally opened on New Year’s Day, for accuracy; and provided an economic draw for those 1892.4 • Recognize that students will need in less prosperous European countries.2 help to sort fiction from reality. During this time, New York itself was Annie Moore’s American Story Let’s consider these problems in rela- growing, cow pastures were quickly Begins tion to teaching about Irish immigration being turned into brick and stone multi- When Ellis Island officially opened in New York and the Irish immigrant floored structures; apartment buildings its doors on January 1, 1892, the first Annie Moore. were growing across the skyline to create person registered at the immigration homes for the new immigrants. station was a young Irish girl named Irish Immigration in New York In schools today, students are often Annie Moore. She must have seemed From 1820 to 1920 more than four taught the story of these immigrants like an ideal poster child for America’s million people left Ireland bound for through the passageway of Ellis Island. welcome of immigrants: young, but not the port of New York and the chance The decision to open a federally-reg- too young to travel without adults, and M AY /JUNE 2008 203 lovely to look at (no apparent deformity or illness). Fourteen-year-old Annie and her two brothers, Anthony, 11, and Phillip, 7, departed from Cobh, Ireland, formerly Queenstown (County Cork) on December 20, 1891, aboard the S.S. Nevada, three of the 148 steer- age passengers. The trip took a total of 12 days including Christmas Day. The Nevada arrived in New York on Thursday evening, December 31st. The Moore children were coming to America to reunite with their parents, Matthew and Julia, who had come first. Matthew was a longshoreman.5 On American Soil On the morning of New Year’s Day, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, LC-USZ62-7386 1892, (which was also Annie’s fifteenth birthday) first- and second-class passen- gers disembarked in Manhattan before the Nevada moved toward Ellis Island. The 148 steerage passengers were placed on an immigrant transfer launch that was able to manage shallow water—the John E. Moore. It was decorated with bunting and pulled alongside the wharf with bells clanging and whistles blowing. A New York Times article (January 2, 1892) reported that there were three steamships in the harbor waiting to land their steerage passengers at the new sta- Hendley’s request and personally pre- Approximately 2 percent of immi- tion and much anxiety and anticipation sented Annie with a $10 gold coin. It was grants were sent home each year—per- among the immigrants. The Nevada the first United States coin she had ever ceived as a potential liability for the arrived late on New Year’s Eve, forc- seen and reportedly the largest amount nation. It was feared that America would ing steerage passengers to stay on board of money she had ever possessed. The become either the hospital or the prison until morning. To complete this celebra- Times reported: “She says she will never for the world.9 One in five spent long, tory moment, the first to embark must part with it, but will always keep it as a anxious days in detention or quarantine, have been carefully, though quickly, pleasant memento of the occasion.” 7 some merely waiting until they could be selected. “The honor was reserved for processed, others until officials were a rosy-cheeked Irish girl...” the Times The Ellis Island Experience for satisfied that they had met all require- reported.” As soon as the gangplank was Immigrants ments for admission. run ashore, Annie “was hustled ahead Though hours of congestion, medical Ships that came in after the island had of a burley German by her two younger examinations, and interviewing awaited been packed to capacity were forced to brothers and an Irish longshoreman who most immigrants, the New York Herald keep steerage passengers on board until shouted ‘Ladies first!’” 6 reported that Annie was hurried along the crowds eased, a process that some- Annie was the first immigrant (of to the waiting room to meet her parents times took days. First- and second- class 445,987 immigrants that year) to be in less than half an hour from the time passengers did not have to go through processed at the registry desk. Charles she landed (January 2, 1892, p. 2). This Ellis Island. They were given a cursory Hendley, the former private secretary of was quite unusual and was most likely examination on board and allowed to Treasury Secretary William Windom, due to Annie’s newfound celebrity. For pass directly into New York City, while asked for the honor of processing the most immigrants the process was much third class (steerage) passengers waited first immigrant. Colonel Webber, the more tedious and time consuming, often on board. Ships officers were brusque, superintendent of immigration, granted traumatic.8 if not rude, in readying remaining pas- S OCIAL EDUCATION 204 Approximately 2 percent of immigrants were sent home each year—perceived as a potential liability for the nation. It was feared that America would become either the hospital or the prison for the world. sengers for arrival. They pushed and wrong, a chalk mark was made on that prostitutes. They were then divided into shoved, shouted demands, herded pas- individual’s lapel. The chalk marks were groups based on information recorded sengers into groups “as though they were coded: B for back; C for conjunctivitis; on the ship’s manifest. Interpreters were animals.” 10 Ct for trachoma; E for eyes; F for face; provided, but often the barrage of ques- Doctors, clerks, translators, baggage Ft for feet; G for goiter; H for heart; tions caused much confusion and mis- handlers, ticket agents, and food suppli- K for hernia; L for lameness; N for understanding. Inspectors had to deci- ers on the island were overworked and neck; P for physical and lungs; Pg for pher names from the handwritten ship’s frequently abrupt, often untrained for pregnancy; Sc for scalp; S for senility; manifest; as a result, many names were their assigned job. Work on the island X for mental retardation; and a circled changed or simplified on Ellis Island. was difficult and strenuous. Inspectors K for insanity. The medical examina- It was not unusual for immigrants to worked seven days a week during heavy tion was the most dreaded part of the leave home with one name and arrive immigration times; it was a constant process for immigrants.14 Immigrants, in America with another. Many were grind from the moment they caught many of whom had never before been detained unfairly—especially those the ferry for the island and got into to a doctor, were forced to partially dis- classified as mentally deficient—many their uniforms until they left by ferry robe in groups for examinations that wrongly diagnosed due to communi- at night.11 As a result, the processing of they did not understand and found cation problems between doctor and immigrants was not often carried out humiliating: males were told to expose patient. Annie Moore and her brothers with courteousness. their penises; women were told to open missed the worst of this process.18 After disembarking, passengers were their blouses.15 separated down a maze of aisles leading Most dreaded was the eye examina- Annie’s Story Goes Awry—What to the seated registry clerks.
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