Wednesday 12/12/12

1. Wednesday 12/12/12 • Goal: discuss why immigrants came to the United States. • Warm up • Think about the longest and most difficult trip you have ever taken. Write a journal entry that answers the following questions: • Where were you going? Why was it important to get there? Why was the journey so difficult? Was it worth the effort?

2. Homework: Write a one paragraph essay on why or why not your family should immigrate to the United States in the early 1900s. Information will be in today’s video. (Imagine your family is living in Europe or Asia at the time.)DUE ON THURSDAY!

3. Immigration 1865-1915 More than 13.5 Million Immigrants came to the United States

4. Today’s activity • Read who you are on your index card. • Find family members. • Have a family meeting and decide what factors would cause you to immigrate to the United States. (pages 600-601) • Fill out Manifest form. Be sure to list each family member. Use your imaginations on the form.

5. Push factors Pull factors

6. *In the five decades after the Civil War, roughly 1865-1915, a flood of immigrants came to America. From 1865 to 1900, some 13.5 million immigrants arrived in America. Coming to America

7. * Wars, famine, religious persecution, and overpopulation were the four major reasons why people left Europe and came to the United States. Why did they come?

8. How did they get here? • * Passage to the United States often cost a life’s savings. Because of this cost, entire families would often save enough money to send just one or two family members to America, hoping that eventually these members could afford to bring over the rest of the family.

9. *The crowded steerage deck usually contained a diverse group of people. Many were poor farmers whose fathers’ or grandfathers’ land had been divided so often that the plots were no longer large enough to support even single families. On the Boat http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4wzVuXPznk

10. Others were schoolmasters unable to find work or artisans looking for greater opportunities. Many were young men and women willing to risk traveling to an unknown land in hopes of finding a brighter future. The Promise of a Better Life

11. Travel Dangers • As for conditions below decks, an agent for the United States Immigration Commission described them as follows: “During the twelve days in the steerage I lived in…surroundings that offended every sense. Only a fresh breeze from the sea overcame the sickening odors. Everything was dirty, sticky, and disagreeable to the touch.” In such conditions, disease and even death were not uncommon.

12. *In 1890, Congress designated low-laying, three- acre Ellis Island in Upper New York Bay as an immigration station. By the end of 1910, six million immigrants had come through Ellis Island. Ellis Island

13. *The immigration inspection process was a humiliating and dehumanizing experience for many. Newly arrived immigrants were given medical inspections and asked 32 background questions. Immigrants with contagious diseases were shipped back. Inspection

14. With the huge numbers of immigrants, inspectors had just 2 minutes to complete the process and many immigrants had their last names changed by the inspectors because they didn’t have the time or patience to struggle with the foreign spellings.

15. *Long lines of immigrants were tagged according to what language they spoke and marked with chalk according to the medical ailments they suspected of having and they waited for the inspectors to decide their fate. Waiting

16. Some native-born Americans feared and resented the new immigrants. Their languages, religions, and customs seemed strange. They also competed for jobs. Desperate for jobs, immigrants often accepted lower wages and worse working conditions. What was it like here for them?

17. *The majority of immigrants settled in the big cities where factory jobs were available. By 1900, 4 out of every 5 people in New York City were immigrants or children of immigrants. * Many immigrants lived in areas with people of similar ethnic background. Such neighborhoods provided support but separated the immigrants from the rest of Americans thus slowing their assimilation into US culture. Where did they live?

18. Thursday 12/1/11 • Warm up • City Life!! Free write for three minutes on positive and negative images or feelings of what it would be like to live in a large city. • GOAL: to describe where immigrants lived when they came to the United States.

19. Activity • Text book read pages 606-610 • Groups of four • City officials • Tenement dwellers • Middle-class/wealthy city dwellers • Reformers • Each group should find and present at least two problems that the group can discuss. • Write out your problems and solutions to the problems and present to the class.

20. Activity follow up • Which of the problems that the groups presented do cities still face? • What new problems do cities face? • What are possible solutions to the new problems?

21. *Many immigrants lived in crowded tenement buildings. Families shared living space and decent lighting & fresh air were scarce. * In the Tenements

22. Living Conditions • Conditions were uncomfortable, crowed, and dirty. • In New York, 1,231 people lived in only 120 rooms in one part of the city. • In Chicago in one year, over 60% of newborns never reached their first birthdays. Many babies asphyxiated in their own homes.

23. Many immigrants had no home and slept in 5 cents a spot rooms where people paid for a small space to spend the night. Can you imagine sleeping crowded against strangers? “Five Cents a Spot” Rooms

24. An immigrant himself, Jacob Riis was well known for his photographs documenting the lives of immigrants & the urban poor in his book How the Other Half Lives. Jacob Riis