American Passage

American Passage explores the remarkable saga of America’s landmark port of entry, from immigration post to deportation center to mythical icon.

“A finely honed account that encompasses both the human story of the immigrant experience, often a sad one, and the political and bureaucratic responses.” —Boston Globe

For most of New York's early history, Ellis Island had been an obscure little island that barely held itself above high tide. Today the small island stands alongside Plymouth Rock in our nation's founding mythology as the place where many of our ancestors first touched American soil.

American Passage captures a time and a place unparalleled in American immigration and history, and articulates the dramatic and bittersweet accounts of the immigrants, officials, interpreters, and social reformers who all played an important role in Ellis Island's chronicle. In this sweeping, often heart-wrenching epic, historian Vincent J. Cannato reveals that the history of Ellis Island is ultimately the story of what it means to be an American.

“By bringing us the inspiring and sometimes unsettling tales of Ellis Island, Vincent Cannato’s American Passage helps us understand who we are as a nation.” —New York Times bestselling author Walter Isaacson

“Cannato resists the temptation to sentimentalize Ellis Island. He understands that, now as then, immigration is an issue that leaves Americans uncomfortable and contentious, even as it continues to bring new blood and energy into the country. Ellis Island may have been converted into something of a feel-good theme park, but the questions it raises remain unresolved.” —Washington Post