Monthly Archives: March 2024

Posted in opinion

ELLIS ISLAND: THE ULTIMATE TEST

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

                           Ellis Island

Well, so far, I have not been burgled by the Chilean crime tourists, but I came very close. One evening two weeks ago, a trio of them were caught by our security department trying to get into our community.  Around 8:30, just when I was settling down with my book, I heard helicopters overhead.  For the next seven hours police helicopters circled over my house and directed their floodlights into my front and back yard several times.  They were shouting from their bullhorns, “Come out, with your hands up!”.  I assumed they meant the burglars and not me.  Thankfully by 6:30 the next morning they caught them. That’s the good news.  The bad news is that their presence in our city has generated a lot of conversation about out our immigration and visa policies and, as is usual these days, the “conversations” soon devolve into political debate.  People WRITE IN ALL CAPS in the hope it will make their point more factual.  Coincidentally, last week I received an email from the history site I subscribe to that contained a piece about Ellis Island.  Although I am unofficially the family historian, I’ve never paid that much attention to Ellis Island, as both our maternal and paternal great-grandparents immigrated from Europe between 1854 and 1880, before Ellis Island was established. I thought in light of the current national debate about immigration it might be useful to look back at our previous methods of screening immigrants.  I learned a lot.  Okay, maybe my previous knowledge was a low bar, but I hope this piece also provides some new insights for you too.

First, the basics.  Ellis Island was the designated as the official federal port of entry from Europe in 1892. Prior to that, immigration policies had been handled at a state level.  Up until the late 1880’s, most immigrants to the U.S. were from Germany, Ireland, Britain and the Scandinavian countries.  But political and economic turmoil in other parts of Europe caused a surge in immigrants to the U.S.  Among this new generation of immigrants were Jews escaping czarist Russia and eastern Europe, as well as Italians escaping poverty in their country. There were also Poles, Hungarians, Czechs, Serbs, Slovaks and Greeks, along with non-Europeans from Syria, Turkey and Armenia, fleeing for the prospect of a better life in America.  Due to the influx of “new” immigrants, congress acted to establish immigration policies at a national level.  So, a whopping $75,000 was appropriated for construction of the first federal immigration station on Ellis Island.

The new Ellis Island port of entry opened on January 1, 1892, on six acres of land.  Each arriving passenger (almost all immigrants arrived by ship) went through an inspection process that lasted about two hours. Doctors would examine immigrants for signs of physical ailments or mental illness; at one point, they would flip back people’s eyelids to look for a contagious eye disease. If an immigrant had one of these problems, then a letter symbol would be drawn on his or her jacket with chalk — for example, E for eyes or X for suspected mental problem. And contrary to popular belief, the process did not involve changing one’s surname to one that’s easier to pronounce, which is one of the biggest myths that persists about Ellis Island. If names were changed, that would happen earlier, when the ship’s manifest was written in Europe at the home country’s consulate. Overall, despite these procedures, only two percent of immigrants were turned away.

           A ship arriving in 1907

From 1900 to 1914—the peak years of Ellis Island’s operation—an average of 1,900 people passed through the immigration station every day. Most successfully passed through in a matter of hours, but others could be detained for days or weeks. The record for the number of people processed in a day was April 17, 1907, when more than 11,747 people passed through Ellis Island.  April 1907 was, in fact, a banner month for Ellis Island, with more than a quarter-million passengers from around the world coming through. That year was Ellis Island’s peak year, as more than 1.2 million immigrants came to the United States.  Immigration slowed after that in part due to a new federal law excluding persons with physical and mental disabilities, and children arriving without an adult.

World War I caused a huge drop in immigrants, from 178,416 in 1915, to 28,867 in 1918.  The military took over the island during World War I to use as a place where injured soldiers could be sent after the war for recuperation. In 1917 a literacy test is introduced for all immigrants; it stayed on the books until 1952. Those over the age of 16 who could not read 30 to 40 test words in their native language were no longer admitted into the country. Nearly all Asian immigrants were banned for no other reason that just being Asian.

In 1921 President Harding signed the Emergency Quota Act into law, which stated that annual immigration from any country could not exceed 3 percent of the total number of U.S. immigrants from that same country, as recorded in the census of 1910.  The Immigration Act of 1924 went even further, setting strict quotas for immigrants based on country of origin, including an annual limit of 165,000 immigrants from outside the Western Hemisphere.  Interestingly, by 1932 the Depression had taken hold in the U.S., and for the first time ever, more people left the country than arrived.

Japanese on a harbor boat to Ellis Island

From the 1920s to 1950s, Ellis Island was mostly used as a detention center; during World War II specifically, it served as a detention center for “enemy aliens” who were Japanese, German or Italian.  After the war, with the advent of modern air travel, immigration points were established throughout the country and Ellis Island fell into disrepair.  It was permanently closed in 1954 and was not reopened until 1990, when it became a museum.

I found the history of Ellis Island fascinating and given its history and all that has happened since its closure, it’s clear there is no simple answer to immigration policies.  Although little common sense in Washington DC might go a long way.  Maybe we need to re-institute an immigration law from 1875 and impose it on Congress: it restricted “lunatics” and “idiots”.

Posted in Holiday observations

May You Be in Heaven . . .

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AN HOUR BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU’RE DEAD!

BY BOB SPARROW

I REALIZE I’M A DAY LATE (AT LEAST) AND A FEW EUROS OR POUND STERLINGS SHORT, BUT I CAN’T LET ST. PATRICK’S DAY PASS WITHOUT A TIP OF THE PADDY CAP TO THE IRISH. THIS BLOG IS WRITTEN IN LARGE BOLD LETTERS, AS IT’S THE WEEK AFTER ST. PATRICK’S DAY AND I KNOW SOME OF OUR FOLLOWERS’ HEADS MAY BE SOMEWHAT FOGGY FROM A BIT TOO MUCH OF THE ‘GARGLE’.  I’LL TRY TO KEEP IT SHORT FOR YOU.   

WHILE I DON’T SUPPOSE ANY OF YOU ARE THE LEAST BIT INTERESTED IN THE HISTORY OF ST. PATRICK’S DAY, SINCE IT PASSED LAST SUNDAY, I’M GOING TO GIVE  IT TO YOU ANYWAY, AS MY OWN BRAIN IS A BIT FUZZY.  THE MAN FOR WHO ST. PATRICK’S DAY IS NAMED, WAS BORN INTO AN ARISTOCRATIC FAMILY IN ROMAN BRITAIN AROUND THE END OF THE FOURTH CENTURY, AND AS A TEENAGER WAS KIDNAPPED BY IRISH PIRATES AND TAKEN TO IRELAND WHERE HE WAS A SLAVE FOR A NUMBER OF YEARS.  HE EVENTUALLY ESCAPTED AND ENDED UP RETURNING LATER AS A MISSIONARY COVERTING THE RESIDENCE THERE TO CHRISTIANITY.  HE DIED ON MARCH 17 AND THAT BECAME A HOLY DAY FOR THE CATHOLICS. 

SO IT STARTED AS A VERY SOLEMN CELEBRATION, BUT WHEN IT CAME TO AMERICA IN THE 1760S, THE IRISH SOLDIERS SERVING HERE IN THE BRITISH MILITARY, HAD A PARADE . . . AND NO DOUBT HAD A COUPLE OF COLD ONES, MAYBE MORE THAN A COUPLE!  BUT IT WASN’T UNTIL THE 1970s THAT PUBS IN IRELAND, WHICH WERE PREVIOUSLY CLOSED TO CELEBRATE ST. PATRICK DAY, BEGAN TO OPEN UP AND CELEBRATE WITH A PINT OR TWO.  LEAVE IT TO THE AMERICANS TO TAKE A SOLUMN RELIGIOUS HOLIDAY AND TURN IT INTO A DRUNK-FEST.

I AM ONE OF 35 MILLION AMERICANS WHO CLAIM TO HAVE IRISH IN THEIR HERITAGE – 11% ACCORDING TO ANCESTRY, AND I’M 57% ENGLISH & NORTHWEST EUROPE (I’M THINKING MOSTLY NORTHERN IRELAND!)  SO, ON ST. PATTY’S DAY I FIXED MYSELF AN ‘IRISH CAR BOMB’, OOPS, NOT SUPPOSE TO CALL IT THAT ANY MORE, THAT’S POLITICALLY INCORRECT, IT’S NOW CALLED A ‘IRISH SHOT’.  SURE, I’LL GIVE YOU THE RECIPE: PUT 1/2 OZ OF IRISH WHISKEY AND 1/2 OZ OF BAILEYS IRISH CREAM IN A SHOT GLASS AND DROP IT IN A PINT OF GUINNESS BEER.  SHIVER ME TIMBERS!

A FEW, SOMEWHAT INTERESTING FACTS, ABOUT IRELAND AND THE IRISH . . .

  • IN 1921, THE IRISH SUCCESSFULLY FOUGHT FOR INDEPENDENCE AND IRELAND WAS PATITIONED INTO TWO COUNTRIES: THE IRISH FREE STATE, WHICH WAS ALMOST ENTIRELY CATHOLIC, AND THE SMALLER NORTHERN IRELAND, WHICH WAS MOSTLY PROTESTANT.

 

  • ‘THE TROUBLES’, LASTING FROM 1968 – 1998, WAS THE NAME FOR THE VIOLENT SECTARIAN CONFLICT BETWEEM IRELAND AND NORTHERN IRELAND; IT IS OFTEN THOUGHT OF AS A RELIGIOUS WAR, BUT IT WAS REALLY THE FIGHT OVER WHO CONTROLED NORTHERN IRELAND, THE IRISH (MOSTLY CATHOLICS) OR THE ENGLISH (MOSTLY PROTESTANTS).

 

  • THE ENTIRE COUNTRY OF IRELAND ONLY HAS A LITTLE OVER 5 MILLION PEOPLE.  AS A REFERENCE, NEW YORK CITY ALONE HAS A POPULATION OF OVER 8 MILLION. BUT DESPITE ITS SIZE, IT HAS A HUGE PERSONALITY – THEY LOVE TO SING, DANCE, FIGHT, DRINK AND DRINK SOME MORE.

An Irish Toast

  • LUCK OF THE IRISH – THE PHRASE ACTUALLY CAME FROM THE CALIFORNIA GOLD & SILVER RUSH, THE IRISH SEEMED TO BE ABLE TO FIND THESE ORES BETTER THAN ANYONE ELSE.  THE RARE FOUR-LEAF CLOVER IS CONSIDERED TO BE LUCKY AS IS CAPTURING A LEPRECHAUN, AS THEY ARE TYPICALLY ACCOMPANIED BY POTS OF GOLD AND RAINBOWS.  OK, NOW I THINK IT’S THE IRISH WHISKEY TALKING! 

 

  • KISS THE BLARNEY STONE – YOU’LL SUPPOSEDLY RECEIVE THE POWER TO PERSUADE IF YOU KISS THE STONE OUTSIDE THE BLARNEY CASTLE IN IRELAND.

 

  • THE CURRENCY IN THE REPUBLIC OF IRELAND IS THE EURO, WHILE NORTHERN IRELAND USES THE POUND STERLING.

 

  • AN IRISH GOODBYE IS MAKING A SNEAKY EXIT FROM A GATHERING WITHOUT SAYING GOODBYE FIRST.  AND SPEAKING OF GOODBYES, IT’S MY TIME FOR ME TO DO SO, AND I LEAVE YOU WITH ‘SLAN LEAT’ – IRISH FOR “GOODBYE AND GOOD HEALTH.”

ERIN GO BRAUGH, WHICH IS GALIC FOR ‘IRELAND FOREVER’.  AND OF COURSE THERE IS ‘ERIN GO BRAUGH-LESS’, BUT THAT’S A TOPIC FOR ANOTHER BLOG. 

 

    

 

 

 

 

Posted in opinion

IT’S ALWAYS A GOLFER’S FAULT

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Yesterday marked the beginning of Daylight Saving Time, an annual event that causes grousing throughout the world from people who wonder where they go to get their lost hour back.  And no wonder. Daylight Saving Time (DST) has been linked to negative health consequences that include increased risk of heart attack, traffic accidents, sleep disruption (duh!), mood changes, depression, weight gain, and cluster headaches.  Not to mention getting called out by the boss for being late to work.  As a resident of Arizona, I no longer have to worry about DST, as our state, as well as Hawaii and several U.S. territories in the Pacific Island region, don’t believe in such tomfoolery.  We get enough sun during the summer to last the whole year – we don’t need to have any more “sunshine saving” when it’s 110 degrees outside.  But why does most of the world observe DST?  Turns out, it all started with a man and his golf game.  That always spells trouble.

   William Willet

One of the first people to advocate adjusting the clock seasonally was a British builder named William Willett.  He had noticed that few people were out in the early morning light during the summer because their clocks indicated it was too darn early to be up.  More importantly to Willett, his golf games often ended early because it became too dark to play. So in 1907 Willett started a campaign to “save” daylight by adjusting the time.  He published “The Waste of Daylight,” in which he suggested changing the clocks at 2 a.m. on Sundays during the spring and fall — something we still do today. But, unlike today, the transition was to happen 20 minutes at a time over the course of four weeks, twice a year, for a total of eight time changes each year. And rather than an even hour, the time difference would be 80 minutes. Willett’s proposal was considered in the British House of Commons in 1908, but it was soundly rejected. Who in the heck wanted to change the time eight times a year?!

But during World War I many countries were looking for new ways to save money. Inspired by Willett’s original proposal, which had included estimated savings in electricity costs, Germany and Britain implemented “Summer Time” in 1916, changing the clocks just one hour twice a year. Ironically, Willett died of influenza in 1915, so he didn’t live to see his idea come to fruition. The United States first observed daylight saving time on March 31, 1918.    Originally scheduled for six months of the year, it was extended by Congress in 2005 to eight months.

According to the most recent polling, most people aren’t feeling great about DST.  More than 40 states have passed legislation to make either daylight saving time or standard time permanent.  The problem is that states don’t have the authority to actually stop the clocks from moving forward or back. That authority rests with Congress.  Senator Marco Rubio and Rep. Vern Buchanan have tried several times to make daylight saving time permanent with the “Sunshine Protection Act”. While the Senate has passed the bill, it has stalled before a House vote and has never gone before President Biden to be signed into law.  Given the ability of our elected representatives to agree on anything, I’m not sure the Sunshine Act will ever see the light of day.

The upside of changing clocks is that there has been a tandem effort to remind people to change the batteries on their smoke detectors at the same time they change their clocks.  Because we don’t observe DST in Arizona, I guess I am throwing caution to the wind and will have to suffer the consequences when my units start to chirp – inevitably at 2 a.m.

Posted in Historical • Show Business • travel

Hollywood in the Desert

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by Bob Sparrow

Charlie Farrell and Dinah Shore

I spent last week in the desert . . . whining & dining, the whining mostly took place on the golf course.  Even though it was our 32nd year visiting our timeshare at Marriott Desert Springs in Palm Desert, I’ve found, unlike me, it never gets old.  But you won’t be hearing about my golf game (Thank God!) or the next great place to eat in the desert.  I have something even more mundane than that to discuss this week.

On our way out to the desert on Highway 10, as went by the road sign that read Bob Hope Drive, and it got me thinking about all the streets in this area that are named after celebrities, like Frank Sinatra, Burns & Allen, Bing Crosby, Barbara Stanwyck, Danny Kaye, Ginger Rogers, Dean Martin, Jack Benny, Liberace and many more.

And I wondered, who started all this?  Well, a little research revealed that it was Charlie Farrell, the tennis playing movie star turned hotelier turned mayor and owner of the glamorous Racket Club in Palm Springs.  He saw value in recognizing celebrities, so he and fellow actor, Ralph Bellamy, realized that many actors took advantage of Hollywood’s ‘two-hour clause’ in their contracts, which stated, in the event a ‘re-shoot’ was needed, actors had to stay within two hours of Hollywood – Palm Springs is just under two-hours away.  For those old enough to remember the old television series, My Little Margie, Charlie played Margie’s father.  And yes, of course, there is a Ferrell Drive in Palm Springs.

Other notable ‘street stories’ . . .

Which door does Monty Hall live behind?

Monty Hall Street – in 2000 former Let’s Make a Deal host Monty Hall had a street in Palm Springs named after him. Tourists were encouraged to guess which house he lived in. They were asked, “Does Monty live behind door No. 1, door No. 2, or door No. 3?

Fred Waring Drive – Another interesting resident of the desert was Fred Waring, an American musician, bandleader and radio and television personality.  Many of you, who have blended a Margarita, may have used a Waring Blender, and while he didn’t invent it, his name is on it because he was the money and marketing behind the product.

Gene Autry Trail – The “Singing Cowboy”, was a movie and TV star of the ‘40s and ‘50s and a Palm Springs entrepreneur.  He bought his first Palm Springs home in 1940, and a Palm Springs Holiday Inn in 1961, which he turned into the Gene Autry Hotel; his mid-century residence on the hotel grounds is an elegant guest suite.

Kirk Douglas Way – movie star Kirk Douglas, who passed away just four years ago at the ripe old age of 103, was a resident of Palm Springs for more than 40 years.  His house backed up to Dinah Shore’s house in the celebrity-packed Las Palmas neighborhood.

The ‘Singing Cowboy’

Dinah Shore Drive – the vivacious ‘40s, ‘50s, ‘60s singer, TV personality and avid golfer, put the LPGA on the map in 1972 when she founded the Colgate-Dinah Shore golf tournament at Mission Hills County Club (Now know as the Chevron Championship and it has moved to Houston).  Her Palm Springs house is now owned by Leonardo DiCaprio.  So look for a DiCaprio Drive soon!

As I thought about all these stars of the past, I thought that my kids would be somewhat familiar with most of the above names, but their kids will have no idea why these streets are named after these random people.  For me, it was an interesting trip down another street, Memory Lane; I hope it was for you too.