Immigrants celebrate seeing The Statue of Liberty as their ship pulls into New York harbor, circa 1900
The harbor is alive with the din of clanging bells, groaning ship hulls, and the steady, rhythmic churn of waves against the docks. Overhead, the gulls wheel and cry, oblivious to the drama unfolding below. The immigrants crowd the railings of the great ocean liner, jostling for space, each eager for their first glimpse of the new world—a world they have crossed oceans to reach, leaving behind homes that could no longer sustain them, or worse, rejected them entirely.
