Hump Day History
Welcome to Angel Island Immigration Station.
From 1910-1940 it is estimated that 300,000 immigrants came through here, and approximately 1/3 were of Chinese descent.
Poetry found on barracks walls has helped to classify this as a National Historic Landmark. Some are written in ink, others carved with a Cantonese technique.
The government tried placing signs to discourage what they saw as destruction, but the Chinese poetry led other immigrants to respond in kind. Japanese, Russian, English, and South Asian languages can also be found in the barracks.
In 1970, Ranger Alexander Weiss entered the building ahead of demolition plans. Upon seeing the walls, and against orders, he contacted San Francisco State professor George Araki about the inscriptions. This started a movement to protect the Station, and by 1983 it was officially opened as a museum.
The largest percentage of Chinese immigrants came from an area in Guangdong Province known as the Toishan District. Yui Poon Ng read several of the poems and donated the videos to the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation.
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