Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-04-17
HEAVY IMMIGRATION
ESTIMATE FOR 1oO6-ELLIS IS
LAND FORCE oVERWoRKED.

When the immigration authorities at Ellis
Island, New York, got on the Job yesterday
morning they knew from the list of steam
ers piled up and waiting to be cleared that
the bureau had ahead of it the hardest day
and the hardest week in its history. They
had hardly settled down to work on a horde
of Italian immigrants when the telephone
began to ring. More immigrant vessels, and
still more. had been sighted at Fire Island,
coming through the fine spring weather to
pile up trouble. The inspectors held con-
ference and laid out the weeks work.
The capacity of Ellis Island is about 5000
immigrants a day. 1t can handle a great
many more on squirt; once, two or three
years ago. 1t put through 1900 a day. But
such pace as that cannot be maintained
without wearing out the force; and 1t was
planned to handle just about 5000 day
and no more.
On that schedule the Nieuw Amsterdam,
which arrived in the morning, was sent to
her dock under guard, with instructions to
keep her immigrants aboard until Thursday
afternoon, the very earliest moment when
she can be disposed of. The Republic, from
Naples. and the iceland, from Antwerp.
which passed Fire Island at noon, will have
to wait until Saturday. Other ships are
to wait until Friday, and anything later
must wait until Saturday. Other ships are
coming deeply freighted They made a snap
the pickings of the year will be about
100000. The greatest year in the past was
100000
$4,000 for the Week.
Forty-five thousand immigrants was the
estimate for the week; the greatest record.
The greatest previous record was made this
year also-the week ending March 81, when
80,7O6 arrived. That beats by 1900 the best
record for q previous year, made in a week
In April, 1908 If this thing keeps up how
ever, last week may be beaten by this and
both by some of the weeks to come.
There may, indeed, come time when the
incoming steamers VIII have to wait more
than a week with the immigrants penned
up in their Storage before they can be
cleared Ellis Island, as has been said, can
handle only so many day. And every
immigrant has to pass through Ellis Island
Therefore the steamship companies will lose
some of the profits of this heavy immigra-
ton traffic through having to feed the
steerage passengers on board and through
delays to vessels kept in port until after
their sailing time The island got through
with $500 yesterday and will handle $40
today The schedules for Wednesday and
Thursday 4,751 and 5,45S respectively.
Many English-Speaking People.
The lot which landed yesterday was
rather unusual for these days in the pro-
portion of northern immigrants. More than
one thousand. or one-fifth of the total, We're
English speaking people-a good proportion
of them Scotch These came on the Cedric,
which carried also a good lot of Germans,
50 that old employees said 1t reminded them
of Castle Garden. Then the Equita sprang
something unusual. It had ,231 Italians,
and not a woman among them. Mostly they
were returning Italian laborers, back from
their winter in Italy to work on dams and
railroads and public works
Further there were very few Russian
Jews, the Jew preferring not te travel in
the time about Passover. The Umbrta. how
ever, did have a few refugees escaping from
the troubles In Russia, set of long
bearded patriarchs in lambskin hats. In
that same batch came set of genuine Cos
sacks-big men in long boots, fur hats and
skfrted coats. These men, with few small
and meek women, are consigned to the
west, where they going to try farm
labor
The officials on the island, although they
keep no regular tabs on that point, believe
on snap judgment that the tendency of
immigrants to pile up in New York has
been stopped The statistics of last month
are unusual on that point. They sent inn
migrants to every state and territory In the
Union and to every one of our foreign pos
sessions, colonies and dependencies with the
single exception OF little Guam. This is the
first time on record that month has COW
cred the entire field.
The number of new arrivals yesterday
was L. S67.