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HTML format Copyright © 1998 Louis S. Alfano
All rights reserved.
Posted to the Comunes of Italy Mailing List by Gay Parisano Raab - 2 October 1998.
When the immigrant has changed his European money for that which passes in this country, on landing at Ellis Island, his next business transaction is most instances is buying something to eat. Within ten feet of the money exchange is the restaurant, although, because of an iron railing, the immigrant must go through another room before he can reach it. The Government sells the right to maintain the restaurant at auction. Although the lines are short and the prices apparently close to the bottom notch, the great number of customers make the business a profitable one. In the competitive sale this privilege brought $10,510 last April for a contract which will not expire until June 30, 1896. Felix Livingston secured the privilege. He says that he believes he has more customers than any other restaurant in the country. It is doubtful if one half of the 343,422 immigrants who landed at Ellis Island last year knew at just what stage of their transit through the big building they ceased to be under the direct orders and supervision of the United States authorities and free to set for themselves.
Some whom a reporter for the New York Times saw last week walked up to the lunch counter and made their purchases in precisely the same perfunctory and routine way that they walked past the inspectors and showed their documentary evidence to enter the country. No complaint is made that he does not manage it as well as any one could or should. But, if it was in dishonest hands, there is a fine chance for defrauding ignorant immigrants. It is doubtful that there is another restaurant in the world where precisely the same conditions exist as at this one. It is on Government property, it is owned by private individuals. The Government assumes to maintain jurisdiction over it. Many of its customers do not now how to count the money which they pay for what they buy. None of them ever saw it before; most of them will never see it again. Their purchases are made in a hurry. They do not ask for prices; there is no time. These are posted conspicuously, but many customers cannot read, and the formality is useless in their cases. They do not ask what is to be had in many instances. They take such quantities as are put into a paper bag and handed to them. They give a piece of money and are give some change. They add the paper bag containing the food to their other bundles and pass on, stolid, stupid, half-dazed, out into the United States.
The man who conducts the restaurant alone knows what his sales amount to. He makes no report to the Government as to the number of sales or their values. The Government sells the privilege; the man who buys it does the rest. No one else - not even the immigrant - has much to say about it.
Why should not the Government control this business, and by a businesslike system of reports make it certain that the immigrants are protected so long as they are on Government property and practically under Government jurisdiction?
The counter where the immigrants buy their first meal is at about the middle of the building at the north side. There is another around in the big room where the immigrants gather before taking the boat for New York City. The first one is just at the head of the stairs by which the horde of Europeans bound for distant States pass down to the big baggage room. This location might be made to cut an important figure in the business. Few of the immigrants can escape the eye of the man who sells pies, bread, and bologna. It is probably a convenience to all concerned to have it there, too. There are odd things in the business of this restaurant. Upon the wall behind the counter is the following bill of fare:
At the bottom of the bill is this notice, in large letters: "Prices are regulated by the Commissioner of Immigration." This notice is posted by virtue of a clause in the contract, which the successful bidder for the privilege makes, under which the Commissioner is at liberty to fix the prices which may be charged for bread, sausage, soup, &c.
No change has been made in prices since this system went into effect. There must have been a good profit in the restaurant at that time, for immigration was heavier than it has been this year, which now brings $10,510, was awarded for $2,400. Under the old system, this award was made without competition, and was considered one of the choice bits of political patronage. This restaurant is no place for an epicure. The bread comes in big loaves. They would make dangerous missiles. The immigrants like them to eat. The pies may or may not be toothsome. No immigrant was found who had eaten one and could speak enough English to tell the reporter how they tasted. After having seen them, hearsay evidence was all the reporter was looking for. The sausage had the appearance of the usual bologna.
Few college graduates have sufficient knowledge of the modern languages to keep this restaurant. It requires a linguist to sell these pies and bologna. The process, as observed the other day, is peculiar. The quantity purchased was fixed by the man behind the counter, and he depended somewhat on the length of the journey ahead of the immigrant. As the half-dazed European approached the stairs where he was to look after his baggage, the man behind the counter shouted at him, in a foreign tongue. Presumably he asked where the immigrant was going, for the latter produced his ticket and showed it to the man behind the counter, sometimes saying something in his native tongue.
"Scranton, eh?" repeated the man who dispensed bread and sausage. The immigrant nodded and grinned, knowing as much about the location of Scranton as he did about Tasmania. Before the grin died away the restaurant man had made up a "Scranton lunch," that is, one which was supposed to be enough to last until the immigrant reached that place. This consisted in most instances of one big loaf of bread, one bologna, a chunk of cheese, and a bottle of beer or ginger ale. If the immigrant had been going further more luncheon would have been sold to him.
These things were put in a bag of tough brown paper, the price was paid, and the immigrant, stolid as a graven image, passed down to the baggage room. This process was repeated at a rapid rate. Bread and bologna went in a steady stream of brown paper bags and cash came to the restaurant. Some days 3,000 luncheons of this type were disposed of.
The immigrant does not know whether he has his money's worth or not. There is no record of his transaction. He makes no protest at this treatment, and if he wanted to, it would be difficult for him to make out a case against the restaurant. One considerable branch of the restaurant business consists of furnishing food to immigrants who are for any reason "detained." There is always a good-sized colony of these, men, women, and children. Some are kept for days, a few for weeks, pending the determination of whether or not they shall be returned. The steamship companies bring these immigrants are, by law, obliged to pay for the food they eat while at this Island.
