Mary Bamford, "Angel Island: The Ellis Island of the West" (1917)

Title: Mary Bamford, "Angel Island: The Ellis Island of the West" (1917)

Collection:

• Early Immigration

Description: Published in 1917, Angel Island: The Ellis Island of the West was written by Mary Bamford a missionary visitor to the Angel Island station. Her book is broken into five chapters: "Angel Island," "Japanese 'Picture Brides,'" "A Chinese New Year's Day in America," "Chinese Cemeteries in San Francisco," "Immigrants from India," and "The Koreans." Throughout the text, Bamford stresses the need for immigration restriction, but also the need for Christian hospitality once immigrants have arrived to Angel Island. In a short section of the first chapter, Bamford describes her attempts to give the detained Punjabis a copy of the Gospel of John, which always results in the detainees giving her a nickel in the ensuing confusion. 

The longer chapter on "Immigrants from India," Bamford explains how many Indians made way into the U.S. via the Philippines, in order to meet the technical requirements of immigration laws. Bamford also includes the testimony of a converted Hindu, Paul Chauvey, who visited the South Asians on the Pacific Coast as an evangelist for three months. Chauvey describes "the stronghold of the Hindu professional crooks who prey on the poor laborers." Chauvey also has this to say: "The Mohammedan laborers seem to be better dressed than the Hindus. They even put on Mexican hats and try to pass off as Mexicans." Chauvey goes on to explain his interactions with students, and categorizes their political leanings as either moderate or extremist. Bamford describes social institutions like the Guru Singh Sahib scholarship, and the San Francisco Hindu temple of the Vedanta Society, which she points out was a temple designed especially for Americans. While describing his visit to the Hindu Temple, Bamford mentions Swami Trigunatita, who hands her a pamphlet titled "A Message From the Hindu Temple." Swami Trigunatita, Bamford explains, died when a fanatic named Louis J. Vavra went into the temple with a bomb and threw it at the Swami, mortally injuring him.