Description
Ellis Island is the small island in New York Harbor where about 12 million immigrants were processed between 1892 and 1954. Its red-brick main hall is now a museum of immigration, reached only by ferry, and it is one of the most moving visits in the city.
The heart of the museum is the vast Registry Room, 200 feet long under a 56-foot ceiling of arched tiles, where newcomers waited for the inspectors' questions. Exhibits upstairs and down tell, with objects and voices, how people crossed, what they carried and how they were treated.
Outside, the Wall of Honor carries the names of immigrants and their descendants, and the Family Immigration History Center helps visitors look for an ancestor in the records.
Annie Moore was 17 and came from Cork, in Ireland, with her two brothers, to join their parents. On January 1, 1892, she became the first immigrant to pass through the station. About 12 million more followed her. According to one estimate, two-fifths of Americans may be descended from them.
Most crossed in steerage: first- and second-class passengers were usually checked on board and went straight ashore. For everyone else, the island was a test. It began on the stairs, where doctors watched the newcomers climb with their baggage, looking for a limp or shortness of breath.
They checked eyes with a buttonhook, and whoever looked sick got a chalk mark on their coat. Some quietly wiped the chalk off, or turned their coats inside out. Those who passed faced the inspectors in the Registry Room: a couple of dozen questions, about name, job and how much money they carried.
About 2 percent were sent back, and the island earned another name: the "Island of Tears." After 1924 it held mostly those to be detained or deported. It closed in 1954, and in 1990 the main building reopened as a museum.
Don't miss
• The Registry Room.
• The Wall of Honor.
• The Family Immigration History Center.
Did you know?
• The famous story of names changed by the inspectors is a myth: they copied the names from the ships' passenger lists, and often corrected mistakes.
• Most of the island is in New Jersey: only the original island belongs to New York, as the Supreme Court ruled in 1998.
• The newly admitted met their families at the "Kissing Post," a wooden column outside the Registry Room.
The heart of the museum is the vast Registry Room, 200 feet long under a 56-foot ceiling of arched tiles, where newcomers waited for the inspectors' questions. Exhibits upstairs and down tell, with objects and voices, how people crossed, what they carried and how they were treated.
Outside, the Wall of Honor carries the names of immigrants and their descendants, and the Family Immigration History Center helps visitors look for an ancestor in the records.
Annie Moore was 17 and came from Cork, in Ireland, with her two brothers, to join their parents. On January 1, 1892, she became the first immigrant to pass through the station. About 12 million more followed her. According to one estimate, two-fifths of Americans may be descended from them.
Most crossed in steerage: first- and second-class passengers were usually checked on board and went straight ashore. For everyone else, the island was a test. It began on the stairs, where doctors watched the newcomers climb with their baggage, looking for a limp or shortness of breath.
They checked eyes with a buttonhook, and whoever looked sick got a chalk mark on their coat. Some quietly wiped the chalk off, or turned their coats inside out. Those who passed faced the inspectors in the Registry Room: a couple of dozen questions, about name, job and how much money they carried.
About 2 percent were sent back, and the island earned another name: the "Island of Tears." After 1924 it held mostly those to be detained or deported. It closed in 1954, and in 1990 the main building reopened as a museum.
Don't miss
• The Registry Room.
• The Wall of Honor.
• The Family Immigration History Center.
Did you know?
• The famous story of names changed by the inspectors is a myth: they copied the names from the ships' passenger lists, and often corrected mistakes.
• Most of the island is in New Jersey: only the original island belongs to New York, as the Supreme Court ruled in 1998.
• The newly admitted met their families at the "Kissing Post," a wooden column outside the Registry Room.