Ellis Island Today
Eleven years after Ellis Island closed, President Lyndon Johnson, understanding the importance of Ellis Island as part of about 40% of the population’s heritage, declared Ellis Island a National Monument under the Antiquities Act. It is currently operated and supported under the U.S. National Park Service. In 1984, the National Park Service and nonprofits like Save Ellis Island stabilized several abandoned buildings. The infamous Main Building underwent significant preservation and restoration work, opening in 1990 for public tours as a museum and historic site. Visitors to New York can plan a day trip to visit both the Statue of Liberty and Ellis National Museum of Immigration and explore the corridors where nervous immigrants like Joseph Haas, Orteste Teglia, and Ellen Knauff waited – sometimes for nerve-wracking yet tedious days, weeks, even months – to see if they would be permitted to fulfill their dream and become an American.
Where Did We Find This Stuff? Here Are Our Sources:
Ellis Island. Editors, History.com. Updated 13 February 2023.
Ellis Island, National Park Service (n.d.)
Ellis Island Oral History Library. (n.a.) Statue of Liberty – Ellis Island Foundation, Inc. (n.d.)
The foods that passed through Ellis Island. Lisa Bramen, Smithsonian Magazine, 6 January 2010.