1. main@groups.jewishgen.org

Re: Buying false papers

Barbara Mannlein <bsmannlein@...>
 

Sally Bruckheimer is correct.    

Names were NEVER changed at Ellis Island or any entry point. Passenger manifests were created from the ticket registers containing the names used when tickets were bought. Names were checked off as passengers boarded. The departure manifest was then given to the Ellis Island officials who used it to create the arrival manifests copying **exactly** what was on the departure manifest. Each passenger WORE A TAG giving his ship's name, manifest page # and line # (and hence his name). All the clerks did was to check the name off a manifest. The clerks did not write anything down at Ellis, they simply checked off the manifest.
It wasn't like a bus full of strangers arrived and officials asked what their name was. There was already a paper trail. EI clerks spoke 2-3 languages each. There was no reason to ask questions in English.

As researcher Sharon Roth pointed out previously, "if the Starbucks barista spells your name wrong on the cup, they aren't  forcing a "name change" on you, since there is no mechanism of enforcement."


1. "Ellis Island Isn’t to Blame for Your Family’s Name Change"

2. "They Changed Our Name at Ellis Island"

3.  "The Myth of Ellis Island and Other Tales of Origin"

4. "American Names / Declaring Independence"
      by Marian Smith, Immigration & Nationalization Svc Historian

5. "Why Your Family Name Was Not Changed at Ellis Island…. "

 6.  "Why Your Family Name Was Not Changed at Ellis Island"

 7. "The Ellis Island Name Change Myth"

 8.  "Jewish Americans changed their names, but not at Ellis Island"

 9. "Just How Were Passenger Manifests Created?"      (2009)
    [senior INS archivist Marion Smith, British genealogists Saul Issrof and Nick Evans.] 

 

10...   From the US GOVT:   (2013)
      safe_image.php.jpg
    “Immigrant Name Changes”
On Jan 19, 2020, at 11:00 AM, Sally Bruckheimer via Groups.Jewishgen.Org <sallybruc=yahoo.com@...> wrote:
"In passing, let me mention that none of the claims made against the involuntary name-changes narratives stands upa to scrutiny and that I have identified a mechanism that would lead immigrants to believe their name(s) had been changed involuntarily by the immigration process."

In spite of what is said here, there were no documents needed to enter the US before WW I, and no names were used at Ellis Island. People there had tags around their necks with the page number and line number of the passenger list. This has been stated repeatedly by the ICE (formerly INS) experts. 

Men in steerage had to appear healthy and able to work, women had to have a husband or father who could support them, and children had to have parents who could support them. People who did not meet these requirements were returned to Europe at the ship-owner's expense, but could later come in a cabin class with no questions asked.

Barbara Mannlein
Tucson, AZ
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