Politics,+Economics,+and+Society

America is not all it was made out to be. Everyday I have struggled and hardships have constantly hung on me. Soon after settling in, I was visited by a clean shaven, kind-looking man. I don't remember his name, but he said he worked for a man called Boss Tweed. He said they had an organization that was often referred to as the //Tweed Ring//. He told me that if i just voted for Boss Tweed on voting day, that he would give me anything i needed or wanted. This was so tempting, i almost immediately accepted until my fathers voice came into my head. He always told me that if something is easy, something is not right. I politely refused, and I'm glad i did because i read in the papers a years later that he was a rotten thief, but a very good one. The house that I moved into with my friends family was called a //row house//. The conditions were horrible, but I never complained. Even when the people next door were so loud i could not think straight, I kept a cool head. I never complained because I was told that they were a step up from //dumbell tenements//. Those, I heard, were almost incable of being lived in, and you often had to live with people you dont know. Just the thought of it makes me flashback to living on the ship. I felt lucky to have friends in the city with me. I always heard about the poor people that had to go to //settlement houses// because they could not even survive in America. I felt that people that helped other people like that were saints. I looked up to //Jane Addams// because of her charity. I got my first job today. I am working in a factory sewing things for a dress. The conditions are horrible and we are treated like we are not even human. We work from 6 in morning to as late as 7 at night. I have become very fast at my job, yet I am paid only 2 dollars a day. This is still more than I could make at home. I heard from my father today. He says things are going well and my sisters are getting soo tall and more beautiful everyday. I could not wait 'til my family could join me. I worried though, how they would survive in this place though. My sisters i worried the most. All around I saw children at my factory, working the same hours as me. They never complained because they knew they were helping their family. This act of child labor was so frustrating, I almost considered joining a protest against it. That is, until I saw how hurt people were afterwards. Most of the people that protested were like me, an immigrant, and were beated by people called //nativists.// They judged all immigrants and wanted them out of the country; they tried to get us all to leave. Because of the new //urbanization// and need for cheap labor, though, it was impossible to keep us all out, and that still frustrates them. Because of my job, I have no free time, but I know the more I work, the closer I am to having my family with me again. In a week, I have enough money to rent the row house next to the family one I am in now. The owners have died, and i need to hurry or I will not get it. With all the work I have been doing, I have saved up enough money. In about a month, I will send for my father, and we will be able to start a whole life as we had planned. My name is Arianna Ferrari and I am on my way to making a new life in America.- Arianna Ferrari

Eckhart Schenck August, 1910

Since I moved into my dumbbell tenement, the city has grown taller, Literally. People are moving about in and out of the city, as buildings grow people spread out. I believe this process is called //Urbanization//, or verstadterung. I've also noticed that there is a huge domination over the politics of this town and nation. A man named //Boss Tweed// is one of the biggest names in government and the organization of //Tammany Hall//, is the biggest ruling organization in the area. I have been lucky enough to find a job I am satisfied with. I am a waiter for a man that runs a German deli. While working there I have to get to know the regular customers and be curtious. I met many interesting people while I was working there. I would work about 10 hours/day and 6 days/week. If I stay all year I'll be getting about $800 for the year. That's more than I can say for the young jüngling that works here. I'm sure there is something wrong with //child labor//, but I like my job and don't want to bring up the subject. One night I heard about the //Triangle Shirt Waste// factory going up in flames. I pray for those that lost loved ones in the horrible katastrophal. I barely have anytime for fun things now that I have a job. I spend most of my free time at the //settlement house//, learning American ways. But when I do have free time, I like to spend it watching beautiful frauen and the city life. I am hoping to meet a beautiful woman and move into a row house with her, maybe even start a family.

__Huete ist Dienstag, den 15. 1893 April__ Bjorn said that I would be working at a cigar factory, but I didn't go, but got a job somewhere else. I was a cabinet maker for another German in the tenement. At my job I have been learning about America and the politics and etc. One thing that came up a lot was the //Tweed Ring//. They say that it is very corrupt, but the major political power in New York though and they kept this power by bribing people and what they called //kickbacks//, where people would get money to not say something that would bring ruin to somebody or organization. I've also talked to people about their living conditions, and they say that if you can afford a //row house// you should live there because they were a lot better than the dumbbell tenements. I also asked questions about the settlement houses, and they told me that it was a place where people could go to learn things, and get some basic job training. There were also a //social gospel movement// that started there, where people believed that they could express their religion through hard work. And that the settlement houses were created by a woman named //Jane Adams//. I also talked to some Chinese workers who could speak English and found out that they lived in big //Ethnic Neighborhoods// and that they were probably having the hardest time in America, because of the //Chinese Exclusion Act//. It sounds like America isn't what everybody says it is. My job though isn't that bad, I get $2 for it, but I do want something more. I was talking to Jens about this when we struck a wonderful idea. It was that we should make a beer brewery together. Jens has $18 and I have $35, for a total of $53. We need $100 to get a good start though. Jens and I worked on recruiting more people (also Germans) into the idea, and got three. It was enough now, so we bought a building and ordered equipment. Jens quit his job to work on the brewery full time, and I kept working to earn some money still. At the end of the second week we finished all of the preparations, and started the first batch of beer. When the batch was done, we gave away samples of it to see if any one would by any. It was quite successful, so we sent our next batch to stores near us. When the sales were good, everyone quit their jobs to work at the factory full time. We even started to hire people to help make production go more quickly, and I had moved into a nice sized house, bigger than a row house too. We had so many people buying our beer, that we made another factory on the other side of the city, and hired more people.

Joseph Kuafmann

__Huete ist Samstag, den 23. 1893 Februar__ Today an new immigrant moved into the tenement whose name is Joseph Kuafmann, he is also a German, no surprise there since it is a German neighborhood. He has been a cabinet worker and I have been working at a cigar factory for the past months and it is not that great. I was wondering if his working conditions were any better, when a great idea popped in my head. I was reading a newspaper a few days back and it mentioned a thing about //Jane Adams// and her settlement houses and something about using skills you are good at. So maybe me and Joseph can create a beer manufacturing factory by getting a couple of people to join us and pool our money together to start a new chapter in our lives. A beer factory would be very profitable here no doubt for nearly every one is a drunk. When I get free time I will tell him of my idea and see what he thinks. A company of my own would be better for it would allow me to have more free time and I can get paid more than my 2 dollars and 50 cents a day. I apparently am not going to follow my fathers dream of politics now, but the politics here do not seem that great here in New York. The Tammany Hall seems to be the center of everything and it always wins, I have a hunch there is some foul play going on especially with the cartoons that are always showing Tweed as bad. But the settlement houses are gaining popularity. That is making it somewhat easier on the immigrants. The Chinese are still having a hard time. __Huete ist Dienstag, den 15. 1893 April__ Me and Joseph are finally getting together to discuss the idea of ours. We were talking and decided to make a beer brewery and see if we could make a tidy profit. I only have 18 dollars now and Joseph has 35 dollars. Together we have 53 dollars and need at least 100 dollars to be safe. So through out the week we got three other people to put there money with ours and we bought a building and started getting the equipment. After the first week I quite my job to work and set up the factory full time, also to start making some recipes. By the end of the second week we had finished preparations and started to make our first batch of beer. When the batch was done we sent it out and had samples throughout the city. It was a instant hit. So the next batch we finished went to the stores around the factory and we sold out by the next day. The other three now quite there jobs and started helping me. At the end of the month I had moved into a brand new house, not a row house either, a house with a nice yard. We started to get back ordered though so Joseph quite his job, we expanded our factory and hired 15 more men, along with two janitor ladies. Jens Deiter --- August 6, 7:20am: I have been in America for a while now and I think I pretty much have the hang of everything. Mom has a job and I have a job. I help Mrs. Johnson clean her house. I met her at the market one day and she asked if I was employed, or looking for work, and I said yes. She said she would like me to clean her house once a week. It fits perfectly with my schedule because most days I have to watch Claire while mother is working, and this way, I can clean when she is off. I am very willing to do this job and really enjoy it, so //Child Labor// isn't a problem. Mrs. Johnson's house is amazing. She lives in a quite new part of town where there is lots of //urbanization//. It isn't very big but it is beautiful inside. She likes to collect art and has many paintings inside. She must be very wealthy if she can afford to hire a cleaning girl. I make 10 cents per cleaning session, which isn't bad, and I enjoy the job very much. Mrs. Johnson is very good to me. She feeds me and I often stay later just to talk with her or play with her kids. We are very busy and there isn't much down time. We are working hard and my mom makes around 60 cents a week. She works as a seamstress. Many women, especially immigrants like us have the same job. My mother goes to the //Settlement// House some evenings to learn more about American culture and reading and writing. Fashion and clothes are very popular now in New York. Politics are also very popular with //Tammany// //Hall//. My mother will be voting for a man who came to our door yesterday. He simply asked her to vote for him, and he gave us five dollars! It was very nice of him. My friend, Sara, who I have kept in touch with, is also voting for him. He is such a nice man and he just goes around giving most everyone gifts, just for voting for him. I don't completely understand, but some say that they are frauds. We simply couldn't afford not to vote for him. Those people say that those men use their power illegally for their personal gain, and recieve //Kickbacks.// Otherwise, I am really enjoying New York. One of the things I don't enjoy is how unclean it is though. The streets have trash on them and there is a lot of pollution. It isn't really a big deal though. Mrs. Johnson is always talking about how the police force is corrupt. I don't know exactly what that means but I do know it is not good. Mr. Johnson is a police officer and he is trying to make it right but I suppose it isn't working. Bad people are doing bad things out there and they pay the officers not to get them in trouble. It is a terrible thing. Other than those few things, America is grand. I have kept in touch with Sara and we are together whenever we have free time. She works at the//Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.// We love to explore the city and walk up and downthe streets. It is very interesting to see all the different people and buildings.Many immigrants live in their own separate communities called //Ethnic// //Neighborhoods// with only people from their home. I have visited an Irish communityand enjoyed it very much. But I like not living there because I am giving the chance to learn English and explore things for myself. Well I must go, forthings are getting very busy around here and I am working today. Farewell,

Brigid