THE HISTORY OF ANGEL ISLAND IMMIGRATION STATION

In 1905, construction of the Immigration Station began in the area then known as North Garrison. Surrounded by public controversy from its inception, the station was finally put into partial operation in 1910. It was designed to process Chinese immigrants whose entry was restricted by the Chinese Exclusion Law of 1882.  A rush of immigrants from Europe were expected with the opening of the Panama Canal, but international events after 1914, including the outbreak of World War I, cancelled the expected rush, but Asian immigrants continued to arrive on the West Coast and to go through immigration procedures. Though the largest group of immigrants processed through the Immigration Station on Angel Island were Chinese, over 80 countries were represented by the influx of immigrants.

The influx of Asian immigrants into the United States, dating from the California Gold Rush, created tension between many immigrant groups. During the 1870s, an economic downturn resulted in serious unemployment problems, and led to outcries against Asian immigrants who would work for low wages. This, along with the resentment towards Chinese who were finding themselves successful in the laundry, hotel and fishing industries, led to very restrictive immigration laws. Among the few exceptions, the laws allowed entry to those that had been born in the U.S. or had family who were American citizens. Enforcement of those laws was assigned to the Bureau of Immigration.

When it opened in 1910, the new detention facility on Angel Island was considered ideal by immigration officials because of its isolation. Access to and from the island was very important to control and enforce the relatively new immigration laws and conduct medical examinations to exclude those with certain diseases and disabilities from entering America. There were buildings to hold detainees, a pier, hospital, and regular boat service to the mainland. During the next 30 years, this was the point of entry for most of the approximately 175,000 Chinese immigrants who came to the United States. Most of them were detained on Angel Island from a couple days to a couple months. A few however, were forced to remain on the island for as much as two years.

Interrogations could take a long time to complete, especially if witnesses for the immigrants lived in the eastern United States. Some detainees expressed their feelings in poetry that they carved into the wooden walls of the detention barracks. Others simply waited, hoping for a favorable response to their appeals, but fearing deportation. Many of the poems that were carved into the walls of the barracks are still legible today.

By the time the fire destroyed the Administration Building, immigration had slowed in the country, and the government was finding that the maintenance of the facilities on Angel Island were extremely expensive. Finally, as the U.S. entered WWII, China became an ally to the U.S. and immigration policies on the Chinese changed in response. In August of 1940, a fire destroyed the Administration Building and hastened the government's decision to abandon the Immigration Station. On November 5, the last group of about 200 immigrants (including about 150 Chinese) were transferred from Angel Island to temporary quarters in San Francisco.The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and subsequent immigration laws were repealed with the passage of the Magnuson Act in 1943. 

Today, most visitors to Angel Island find the Immigration Station a place of reflection. While often called the Ellis Island of the West, the U.S. Immigration Station at Angel Island, was in fact quite different. Arrivals at Ellis Island were welcomed to this country by the Statue of Liberty and screened primarily for medical reasons, leaving an average of 2-3 hours of arriving.  At Angel Island, the objective was to exclude new arrivals. Therefore, the memories of many returning visitors are bittersweet. The Immigration Barracks has been restored to allow visitors a glimpse into the life of an immigrant. Through recreated bunk rooms and recreation areas, you can see the spaces immigrants lived while on their journey to a new life in America.

As Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation Executive Director Edward Tepporn has said, “Place matters because it allows us not only to remember, but to feel the history.” Today, the site serves not only as a museum and historic landmark, but as a place to consider our nation’s present and future, too. The station has become a site of pilgrimage––where former detainees, descendants, and community members can come to grapple with, commemorate, and reclaim the spaces and stories as their own. Exhibitions, tours, and programs invite visitors to explore ideas around movement, exchange, and belonging—and to grapple with how the legacy of racism and exclusion continues to drive United States immigration policy. And amid the current wave of anti-Asian racism and xenophobia, the lessons of our shared history grow particularly urgent.   

Immigration Station
https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=1309

To “Feel” History: Angel Island Immigration Station
https://www.mellon.org/grant-story/to-feel-history-angel-island-immigration-station