This is a Family Search program open to the public.

Laura will discuss Ellis Island – Your Immigrant Ancestors’ Gateway to America.

Program description:
The presentation will cover the entire Ellis Island immigration experience for steerage passengers’ starting with embarkation documents.  This topic includes transit to Ellis Island, screening for diseases and mental conditions, detention for medical reasons, the public health doctors who treated people, the hospital, surgical center and psychopathic ward.  Records give clues to whether immigrants were detained for medical reasons.  There may even have been an administrative appeal with a hearing and legal representation.  The story of how an ancestor experienced detention and navigated entry into America may be your family’s history.  Most passed through without any glitches and all kept their name as written on the ship’s manifest.  Available records and photographs allow you to tell your ancestors’ story.  If your ancestor was a radical they may have still passed through unscathed but, as a result of the Palmer raids in the 1920s, anarchists and communists were deported through Ellis Island.  Finally, the immigration center closed and was abandoned.  That is how I saw Ellis Island on my first visit, with deteriorating walls. Today Ellis Island is honored by the National Park Service.  Information provided by this talk will help you understand your family’s immigration experience and acquire specific information relating to your ancestors.