Their questions and my questions

Note: this blog entry, originally written in 2019, was updated in November, 2021.

My tour of the Emigration Museum on Veddel Island in Hamburg, Germany, ended in a room with a huge Statue of Liberty painted pink. Surrounding it on the floor were signs, each one representing one of 29 questions immigrants were asked on arrival at Ellis Island. In addition to the standard expected questions such as name, age, gender, marital status, race, national origin, last address, final destination, name of contact in America and the like, there were others, all designed to weed out unsuitable immigrants.

Leon and Barbara, my grandparents, arrived there on December 20, 1910, after a 10-day journey from Hamburg. There they faced lines--for registration and medical check-ups. They had left Hamburg with two children--2-year-old Marie and baby Kasimir; they arrived with only Marie. Kasimir had died on the journey--we have no records of the cause--most likely of illness contracted on the journey. Like most emigrants coming to America in that era, the Bogdanski family traveled in steerage, while upper and middle class travelers could book a first or second class cabin. At one point Barbara and Kasimir were quarantined in a second-class cabin. As my mother Angeline told me, Barbara believed that "a kind person" had given her the cabin--a sweet story. Yet, I wonder if ship rules mandated that, given the high concern with contagious disease on board.

On arrival, after Barbara and Leon got to the front of a long line, they had (according to the Emigration Museum booklet) 60 seconds to answer the basic questions above along with these: Have you ever been in prison, an almshouse or a mental institution? Are you a polygamist? Are you an anarchist? Are you deformed or crippled? And then there was a critical question about work: a yes answer would result in immediate deportation: Are you coming by reason of any job offer? Then as now, the possibility of immigrants filling jobs that should go to native Americans was a very sensitive subject. Another question, "What is the condition of your health?" was critical. Any answer indicating illness could also get you sent home. Hence, the many medical exams before departure and after arrival. One question never asked in this era was, "Where is your passport?" Although travel documents were necessary before departure, passports were not required upon arrival. Passengers in first and second class were usually spared all this, receiving medical checks in their cabins before being escorted off the ship.

Much has been written about the difficult conditions in steerage compared to first and second class cabins. Steerage reportedly had poor ventilation and poor facilities for maintaining hygiene. Fortunately, due to improvements in steam ships by 1910, the journey was half as long as it had been in the late 19th century. Also, Barbara and Leon were fortunate to travel on the Hamburg-America line.This line, created by Albert Ballin, who was himself an immigrant (to Germany from Denmark), created a good system for passengers waiting to board in Hamburg. (See my earlier blog When Millions Sailed from the Port of Hamburg for more information on this.)

Ballin also created the very popular "one ticket" system.* That means you could buy a train ticket from Warsaw to Hamburg and then upon arrival at Ellis Island continue all the way to your destination. What relief that must have been to anyone about to travel to a country with plenty of unknowns. If the Bogdanski family had this ticket, as is likely, that must have gone a long way to easing their minds.

   

Leon was 30 and Barbara 25* when they arrived at Ellis Island after just 5 days before Christmas. The next step in their journey was a train ride to Chicago. That's where they settled, as they had family expecting them there. Barbara's older sister, Marianna, had arrived from Poland in 1905, traveled to Chicago, and begun earning money as a seamstress. Family lore has it that she earned the money that brought her siblings to America--a common immigrant pattern in that era. In May of 2010, Barbara's mother, Agnieska Lugowska, and her two sisters, Valentina and Anna, arrived at Ellis Island, continuing on to Chicago. The destination they listed was the Chicago address of Felix Lugowski, Agnieska's husband. How long they stayed there, if at all, is unknown.

There are no diaries or handed-down stories of Barbara and Leon's experiences and impressions as they entered a new country and new life. If you visit the Ellis Island Museum or Statue of Liberty website, you'll find stories of the awe many immigrants felt as they saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time. I wonder if Barbara or Leon felt this, grieving as they must have been so soon after the death of their infant son, and possibly feeling unwell themselves. Perhaps the family's total focus was on the process of disembarkation and the continuation of their journey on land. 

When I was in 8th grade, I memorized and recited The New Colossus,  the famous poem by Emma Lazarus about the Statue of Liberty, written in 1893. The ending stays in my mind:

 “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!”

I thought it was very beautiful and dramatic at the time, but it doesn't impress me so much now with phrases like "wretched refuse".  I much prefer this one instead, written very recently by Tracy K. Smith, US poet laureate 2017-19. It's called Harbor. And I like to imagine it might capture something that Barbara and Leon might have been feeling.

"Stranger, I find myself lost. Let us watch this new age gather

Overhead. Let’s see what rains onto unaccustomed skin.

Once, we were pelt, fur, hide. Only the seasons mattered. Now,

We shiver, crying out. Not from winter, but the fear in skin.

I see the tall masts of history in horizon fog. They dip

And rise. The tides they ride swell under human skin.

Be my guest. Drink tea, taste fruit and bread. The meat rests,

Cooling on the slab, but see how wine has flushed our skin?

This land you’ve sought is peopled with enemies and kin.

You’ll learn to read the whole long story written on skin.

We passengers wait. Our restless waiting forms an island.

One woman stands, sings. Her music enters through my skin.

Stranger, you’re the words to a hymn I’ve only ever hummed.

Come. Let’s erase the distance between skin and skin."

*There is some uncertainty over Barbara's birth date. We believe the likely year is 1885, but it could have been as late as 1889. 

**For an interesting view of the differences between cabins and steerage, see this short video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSBwrCMcj_g&t=206

***For more resources on the experiences of immigrants to Ellis Island, try these sources: https://www.statueofliberty.org/discover/educational-resources/ and https://www.statueofliberty.org/ellis-island/national-immigration-museum/