Who Was Ellis Island's First Immigrant?

On the first morning of 1892, a small boat carried a seventeen-year-old girl from County Cork across New York Harbor to a brand-new station on Ellis Island. Annie Moore became the first person processed there, and the superintendent of immigration handed her a ten-dollar gold piece. For decades afterwards, people told the rest of her story: she went west, married into the family of a famous Irish hero, and died under a streetcar in Texas. It was a dramatic story. It also belonged to somebody else. So what really happened to the girl at the front of the line? The answer is quieter, and much harder. What this covers: Steerage on the SS Nevada out of Queenstown, Christmas at sea, and two younger brothers named Anthony and Philip New Year's morning 1892, a boat called the John E. Moore, and John Weber's ten-dollar gold piece A "little rosy-cheeked Irish girl": the wrong age, the wrong birthday and the wrong brothers' names, from the very first day The legend: Indiana, Texas, a descendant of Daniel O'Connell, and a streetcar around 1923 Two bronze statues by Jeanne Rynhart, and almost twelve million people who came through behind her Megan Smolenyak's PBS research, and the Texas Annie Moore who was born in Illinois The real Annie: the Lower East Side, Joseph Schayer of the Fulton Fish Market, eleven children and six lost young An unmarked grave in Queens, and a Celtic cross of Irish blue limestone in 2008 The papers got her age wrong. The books got her life wrong. She never went west. She went home. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ❤️ It's just me making these. If this one was worth your time, a like helps more than you'd think. If not, all good. See you in the next one. Wren ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ S O U R C E S ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ THE CROSSING AND THE FIRST DAY New York Times, 2 January 1892, as reproduced by IrishCentral, "A rosy-cheeked Irish girl." The John E. Moore, the 148 steerage passengers, Weber's gold piece and "the first United States coins she had ever seen." SS Nevada passenger list, arrival 31 December 1891, National Archives microfilm M237, roll 581, list 8 (Genealogy Branches transcription). The ship's list that gives her age as thirteen. "The Real Story of Annie Moore," Untapped New York. The twelve-day crossing in steerage from Queenstown, Christmas at sea, and the coin. "On New Year's Day 1892 Annie Moore was the first immigrant through Ellis Island," IrishCentral. Arrival on New Year's Eve, processing the next morning, about seven hundred people from three ships. "How did Annie Moore become the first through Ellis Island?" IrishCentral. Why the press took to her, and the doubt over whether she was simply first in line. ELLIS ISLAND National Park Service, "Ellis Island Chronology." Opening day, Annie Moore as the first person processed, and over 400,000 in the first year. National Park Service, "Fact Sheet: Ellis Island" and "Immigration." Almost twelve million immigrants from 1892 to 1954; about 40 percent of Americans can trace an ancestor through it. Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, "Overview + History." More than twelve million over sixty-two years. Heather Cox Richardson, "January 1, 2026," Letters from an American. Castle Garden as the earlier processing center. THE WRONG ANNIE AND THE REAL ONE Megan Smolenyak, "Wrong Annie Moore" evidence album, honoringourancestors.com. The Texas death records from 1923 and the McLennan County cemetery records. Megan Smolenyak, "They Say It's Your Birthday -- But It's Not," Huffington Post, 31 December 2013. Her real age, the New Year's birthday myth, the brothers' real names and Tim McCoy's find in Ireland. "The Cork girl who was first through Ellis Island's gates," Irish Times. The 2002 PBS research, the Illinois-born Texas Annie, Joseph Schayer, and the doubt that she kept the coin. "Annie Moore (immigrant)," Wikipedia. The Lower East Side, the eleven children, her death in 1924 and the Calvary Cemetery grave. "Annie Moore's living relatives discovered by genealogist," IrishCentral. Smolenyak's search for the family. Lucy Kennedy, "Ellis Island's first immigrant honoured," Irish Times, 13 October 2008. The Celtic cross, three generations of descendants, and Ronan Tynan's song after 84 years. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ #history #ellisisland #irishhistory #documentary #newyear