Immigration from 1840 to 1900 Settlement Patterns in the United States

Immigration from 1840 to 1900 Settlement Patterns

Introduction to Immigration from 1840 to 1900 Settlement Patterns

About 70 percent of all European immigrants initially landed in New York City. From New York City, most immigrants fanned out to other areas. Substantial numbers of European immigrants also arrived in Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and New Orleans. During the 1850s almost all Chinese immigrants entered the United States via San Francisco. Wherever immigrants landed, there were railroads to take them to other parts of the country, especially after 1850. Many immigrants knew where they wanted to go, either because they had relatives or friends in a particular region or because they sought particular kinds of work. Those interested working in heavy industry often migrated to inland cities, such as Buffalo, New York; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Cleveland, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; Chicago, Illinois; and Minneapolis, Minnesota.

German immigrants settled throughout the United States. Many Germans moved directly to Texas and the Midwest. Many also settled in New York and Pennsylvania. German Americans generally worked in skilled occupations and in agriculture. Scandinavian immigrants usually took up farming in the Upper Midwest. Immigrants from southern Italy engaged in unskilled labor in every part of the United States. Jewish Americans and Italian Americans typically worked in light manufacturing or retail businesses. Many Italian Americans could also be found in the construction industry. Most Jewish Americans preferred to settle in major cities, such as New York, Chicago, and Boston. Thousands of Jewish men, however, became peddlers and ventured into smaller communities across the United States. Members of Slavic groups, such as Polish Americans and Slovak Americans, often found jobs in heavy industries, such as metal processing and machine manufacturing.

Europeans constituted more than 80 percent of all immigrants throughout the 19th century. Most European immigrants settled in the northeastern and midwestern regions of the United States. Established immigrants, or their children, generally held supervisory posts in industry and white-collar positions in corporations. Women immigrants from many backgrounds worked in laundries, light manufacturing, and retail businesses. Irish American women, in particular, were commonly employed as domestic servants. Most 19th-century immigrants worked in low prestige occupations, earned wages that were insufficient to provide decent standards of living, and lived in shabbily built and overcrowded dwellings without sufficient heat, light, air, or plumbing. One-room cabins abounded in agricultural and mining areas. It often took two to three generations for the children and grandchildren of immigrants to move up the socioeconomic ladder and earn sufficient incomes to provide a comfortable standard of living.

In the West, immigrants were counted in the thousands rather than hundreds of thousands during the late 19th century. Nonetheless, members of almost every ethnic group could be found somewhere in the region. Generally, Chinese Americans worked building the railroads, in light manufacturing, or as domestic and retail workers in mining camps and other places. Mining camps in the Rocky Mountains provided work for European immigrants and Mexican Americans.” (1)

Resources

Notes and References

• Information about Immigration from 1840 to 1900 Settlement Patterns in the Encarta Online Encyclopedia

Guide to Immigration from 1840 to 1900 Settlement Patterns