Huddled Masses

“God bless America, land that I love

Stand beside her, and guide her

 through the night with a light from above.” – words and music by Irving Berlin; 1938

Things didn’t go smoothly for my grandparents Jacob and Magdalena Wolf when they immigrated to the United States in August of 1923.

Most devastating was the death of their baby daughter Laney, who died on January 27, 1923, months before they left their homeland. Their passport photo shows my grandparents, my Aunt Liz at age three, and Laney, whose face was exed out by some official along the route. (The photo has since been photoshopped to reveal her little face under the X.)

When Jacob, Lena, and Lizzie arrived at Ellis Island on August 1, 1923 after their voyage on the ship America, they ran into a snag. It seems that my grandfather misunderstood how much money the family needed in order to enter the country. And, he didn’t have enough. So, he wired his brother Andrew, their sponsor, in Chicago. Meanwhile they were required to remain on Ellis Island until the money arrived.

Detained. Men housed in one area, women and their children in another. Details about their time spent on Ellis Island are sketchy. My grandmother never spoke of it, probably too traumatized to tell the story.  My Aunt Liz, not even four years old at the time, only remembered that her mother cried a lot.

I can only imagine. Grandma was not quite twenty-three. She had buried a child back in her hometown of Neu Banat, Romania. She spoke only German. She wasn’t sure where her husband was. What was going to happen to them?  Would they be arrested? Sent back? How long would they remain housed here? Why had they come?

As for Lizzie, what might she have been thinking? Where was her daddy? Why was her mama crying? Surrounded by strangers, she couldn’t understand the words they spoke. Why weren’t they going on the train ride that her daddy had promised?

A week, perhaps two passed before Jacob was reunited with his wife and daughter and they were able to continue on to Chicago. Their story had a happy ending.

But what if their story had taken another turn?

What if my grandfather had been sent back, since he’d failed to meet the monetary requirement for entry?

What if the President railed against them, called them criminals who were infesting the United States?

What if Lizzie had been ripped from my grandmother’s arms and put behind a chain link wall with other little ones? What if my grandmother couldn’t find out where she was? What if no one had kept track of where Lizzie had ended up? What if my grandparents couldn’t find out where she was, for days, or weeks, or months? Or ever?

What if?

In Chicago, armed with only a sixth grade education and a determination to work hard, the Wolfs thrived. Their family grew. They attained the American Dream.

Their story is like so many others. Yes, they came “legally” – at a time when there were almost no restrictions on who could enter. Might their story be different today?

Irving Berlin and his family fled from Russia when he was five years old, seeking asylum in the United States. If they had come today instead of in 1893, they would probably have been deported just for having the audacity to seek a safe haven from persecution.  Young Irving may have found himself separated from his family and tossed behind chain link fencing. And we’d have no “God Bless America” to sing on the Fourth of July.