Immigrants to the US and the agencies that worked to help them grew out of a request in 2020 from Katie Hudak, Development Coordinator of Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services, Inc. (DMRS) for help putting together a history of American immigration.
Learning about immigration
Almost as soon as I began reading about American immigrants it became clear to me that I really didn’t know very much at all. As a student in the New York City schools in the 1950s and 60s, I remember learning about the “Melting Pot” and the arrival of “huddled masses” at Ellis Island and that was about all.
What I remember learning was, “People were persecuted, so they got on a boat and they were glad to come here where they could worship any way they wanted to.”
The more I read, the more I realized I did not know. And the more I didn’t know, the more I had to read to understand what I was finding. I had to check dates, place names, and many foreign expressions as I went along. I had to weed out some strong opinions that were not supported by the facts. Fortunately, I had access to the wonderful University of Wisconsin Library with its professional library staff and to experts at the Wisconsin State Historical Society.
As a result, a project that I had estimated would take about 8 weeks lasted 6 months.
Help for immigrants
When I was first asked to work on this project, I did some searching online and found many, many websites that told the story of immigrants to America. Many of them (most, in fact) described the experiences of an immigrant group chronologically and used a timeline to help readers visualize the story they were telling.
I couldn’t see any point in merely re-telling the same stories that had already been told by so many others.
When I expressed my frustration to my wife Marjorie, she immediately came up with an idea for a different approach. She suggested that, since I was working for an agency that helped immigrants, I could focus my part of the project on other groups that had worked on behalf of different immigrant groups. It was a brilliant, fresh idea and helped me find a focus for my work.
Armenia, China, Germany, Italian Switzerland, Japan, and Galicia
I chose to tell the stories of people from different parts of the world who immigrated to the US for different reasons. Some got a lot more help than others. Some got almost no help at all.
I wrote these modules for a general audience, omitting some of the more complicated parts of the stories and providing definitions and explanations wherever possible. Longer, more detailed descriptions of what the different immigrant groups experienced are available online and in libraries, so readers who want more depth should have no trouble finding resources. The way Americans view the story of immigration has changed a lot over the years, and authors writing in the 19th and 20th centuries had very different ideas about immigrants, some of which would be considered unacceptably racist, degrading, and inappropriate today.
The story of immigration to America is much, much more complex than I could fit into these brief modules and some aspects are very controversial. I spent a lot of time searching for evidence to support what I was writing. I have added a lot of footnotes with links for readers who wish to see where my information came from.
Two books that can provide a broad overview of the American immigration story, I recommend The Uprooted: The Epic Story of the Great Migrations That Made the American People by Oscar Handlin (1951; New York: Grosset & Dunlap) ISBN-13: 978-0316343138 {available online at <https://archive.org/details/uprootedepicstor0000hand>} and The Atlantic Migration, 1607–1860: A History of the Continuing Settlement of the United States by Marcus Lee Hansen, Edited by Arthur M. Schlesinger (1940; Harvard University Press and 2001; Simon Publications) ISBN-13: 978-1931313292. Both books won Pulitzer Prizes although they have their critics.
Special thanks
I would be remiss in not thanking my wife, Marjorie Zwickel, for bearing with me as I monopolized the computer and built piles of paper and reference books. She proofread and edited the modules and helped me revise the trickier parts. I am truly grateful for her help and insights.
I must also thank Katie Hudak for going along with and championing my eccentric approach to the immigrants’ stories in these modules. The pandemic wrecked most of my post-retirement plans and Katie helped me find something useful to do while waiting for the danger to pass. I appreciate her solid support during these long months of researching and writing.
Steven B. Zwickel
January, 2021
About the Author
Originally from Brooklyn, New York, Steven Bernard Zwickel is a graduate of Binghamton University, where he majored in political science; he has a law degree from Brooklyn Law School (admitted to New York State Bar) and an M.S. in Social Work from the UW–Madison. Mr. Zwickel also earned a Diploma in Graphic Arts/Printing from Madison Area Technical College and worked for several years in the printing industry.
From 1992 until his retirement in 2020, Mr. Zwickel was part of the Technical Communication Program at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He taught undergraduate courses in technical presentations and writing. He is the author of a textbook on public speaking published in both English and Chinese. At UW-Madison, Mr. Zwickel served as Faculty Advisor to the Wisconsin Engineer Magazine for 20 years, as Program Coordinator of a K–12 Engineering Outreach Program, and as Lead Facilitator of Camp Badger Exploring Engineering.
Mr. Zwickel was a clinical social worker (ACSW) in the 1980s, doing individual and family counseling. His experiences led him to write books on dealing with anger, coping with workplace stress, and professional speaking.
For two summers, Mr. Zwickel taught in China, teaching conversational English to Chinese middle school students and Technical Communication to UW students studying in Hangzhou, China.
After retiring in 2020, Mr. Zwickel spent time in Texas as a volunteer with Diocesan Migrant and Refugee Services, Inc. (DMRS) and several other agencies working to help asylum seekers and children at the US–Mexico border.
No comments:
Post a Comment