Ellis Island / Castle Garden ("Kastigari")

  • The medical exam included:
    • Interrogation:
      • Providing wrong answers and/or physical or mental infirmaries:
        • Detention or Deportation.
Historical photo of an eye exam at Ellis Island.

The inspection process was very efficient. In 1907 when my father came, he spent about 3 hours on the island, and it remained a vivid memory for all his life.

  • While still aboard ship he was given an inspection card and was put with others into a group of thirty. The group was taken by barge to Ellis Island, and my father stayed with his group throughout the inspection tour. He was with at least 15 other people from Kos and they made up the bulk of his group.
  • They proceeded to the first floor entrance where my father placed his baggage and personal belongings for the duration of the inspection process. He then climbed the stairwell to the registry room or Great Hall on the second floor.
  • He underwent two exams, medical and legal. The east end of the Hall was set up for the medical exam and west for the legal exam.
  • The medical inspectors who were stationed at the top of the stairs watched as he climbed up. If he showed any difficulty with the climbing he would have been marked with chalk to alert the other medical examiners. The doctor spent about 6 minutes examining him for any physical or mental condition and any symptoms suggestive of a communicable disease. If that were suspected, then he would be detained for a more thorough exam taking about 20 minutes in one of the private exam rooms around the perimeter of the hall.
  • He passed the medical exam, and then was allowed to proceed through the maze of wire and piping toward the west end of the room where the legal exam was conducted. He had the required $25.00, and all verified with what was on the ship's manifest, and he had a place to go. He was then issued a landing card which indicated he was free to enter the US.
  • A stairway at the west end of the registry or great hall led back to the first floor where he could exchanged his drachmas for dollars and obtain a railroad ticket to Lititz, PA. He was also free to send a Western Union Message back to his family right there at the west end of the first floor.
  • He then collected his baggage and along with his landing card prominently displayed on his jacket headed for the ferry or the railroad dock for the next part of his journey to his new life.

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Greek Immigration to America, a slide presentation, delivered originally as a lecture to the Lancaster County Historical Society, Lancaster, Pennsylvania, December 3, 2004.

Copyright © Nikitas J. Zervanos, M.D., 2005. All Rights Reserved.
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Published in PAHH, 2005.

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