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Houston Chronicle
December 9, 2007
By Marianne Means
In retrospect, my grandparents had it easy. They sailed here in steerage from Denmark at the turn of the last century, carrying little money and a squalling infant who much later became my mother. But they were legal, welcomed by a government that had enticed them to come with exaggerated claims of Western glories and jobs, jobs, jobs. Denmark was then, as was much of Europe, in a deep depression and the high unemployment rate was staggering.
In America, they found streets not quite paved with gold, but close enough.
They got their naturalization papers easily and almost immediately — I found my grandfather's in a bunch of old papers still neatly tied in a bundle the other day.
My grandmother never did learn to speak English, but there was a community in Iowa where they settled that still clung to the old ways, memories of the old country, and the old language. They were, I believe, happy. They never earned enough money to return to Denmark, but the new life wasn't bad. In those days, letters were the connecting life line.
I think of them often now as I listen to the political acrimony over the flood of illegal immigrants pouring into our country. It is a very different experience. And the reaction to the newcomers is not, in too many instances, friendly.
It's partly the language barrier. It's partly political pandering. It's partly a scared response to a governmental inability to do something about it. Communities suddenly overwhelmed with Latino strangers and a new, unfamiliar culture are worried about competing with folks willing to accept low pay for unattractive jobs, such as meat-packing and heavy-duty farm labor.
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