Ellis Island: Tracing Your Family History Through America's Gateway

See Larger Image	List Price: $4.95 Our Price: $4.95 Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Manufacturer: Ancestry.com Written By: Loretto Dennis Szucs Average Customer Rating:
Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 929.373 EAN: 9780916489953 ISBN: 0916489957 Label: Ancestry.com Manufacturer: Ancestry.com Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 52 Publication Date: 2000-06-01 Publisher: Ancestry.com Studio: Ancestry.com
Related Items They Came in Ships: Finding Your Immigrant Ancestor's Arrival Record (3rd Edition) Finding Answers in U.S. Census Records They Became Americans: Finding Naturalization Records and Ethnic Origins Family Tree Guide to Finding Your Ellis Island Ancestors: A Genealogist's Essential Guide to Navigating the Ellis Island Database and Passenger Arrival List (Family Tree Guide) Finding Your German Ancestors : A Beginner's Guide
Editorial Reviews: Almost half of all Americans have at least one ancestor who entered the United States through Ellis Island (also called "America's Gateway"). In Ellis Island: Tracing Your Family History Through America's Gateway, leading family history author and researcher Loretto Dennis Szucs explains how you can find out if your relatives were among the millions who were processed for entry at this historic landmark. This book details the immigrant experience at Ellis Island and teaches you about the records that are available to help you trace your ancestors' entry into the New World.
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Collection of platitudes Comment: The first chapters of the book describe the history of Ellis Island, and its role in American history. After reading the first two sentences of the book, we have already learned that Ellis Island is a "treshold of liberty" and "the symbolic shrine to freedom and opportunity". The first half of the book is filled with similar platitudes. The author seems to be more interested in reinforcing romantic prejudices than in factual correctness. An example is name changes at Ellis Island. "Names were often a problem", writes Mrs. Szucs. "Not all immigrants could spell their names, and baffled officials jotted down names as they sounded." Those officials handled thousands of immigrants, and it would take more than a foreign-sounding name to "baffle" them. Name changes at Ellis Island were rare. Mrs. Szucs should have known better. Another myth that the author reinforces but should have debunked is the "ocean journey that could last several months". The era of Ellis Island was also the era of steam ships. Maybe some ocean journeys lasted several months, but most of them lasted only a couple of weeks. Later chapters are more down to earth, giving practical, useful (albeit terse) information on tracing immigrant ancestors (not limited to Ellis Island). More Reviews