Series 3 - Manny Steen memoir

236pp

The memoir was adapted in 1996 by Professor Arnold Schrier, collaborator of Kerby A. Miller, from an interview with Manny Steen, conducted 22 March 1991 by the Ellis Island Oral History Project (corrected and approved by Manny Steen, April 1996).

Emanuel 'Manny' Steen was born in Dublin in 1906 into a working-class Jewish family who had previously immigrated from Glasgow. His mother was born in Poland and his father in Ukraine and they met and married in Glasgow in 1894, eventually moving to Dublin. He was interviewed in 1991 for the Ellis Island Oral History Project and his interview was adapted to a memoir format, as approved by Steen, by Professor Arnold Schrier in 1996. Steen's memoir discusses his early life in Dublin, memories of World War One and 1916, the family's move to Sligo and his time as a student in Sligo's Summerhill College, his decision to move to America and his voyage and arrival at Ellis Island 1925, his early experiences and jobs in New York, and his marriage in 1928. Kerby A. Miller writes: 'Of course, Steen's entire memoir is highly unrepresentative, in that only a very small number and percentage of post-Famine Irish emigrants, even in the 1920s, were Jewish. The total figure of 5,000 comes to my mind. However, the Steen family's working-class Dublin circumstances, his and his siblings' eventual emigration for economic reasons from depressed postwar Ireland, their voyage, arrival, and the unfeeling treatment they experienced from Ellis Island officials-these were quite typical of most Irish emigrants-and wonderfully told in the "memoir". Very good also on Steen's first impressions of New York City life, of his first jobs, and of course his harsh encounter with anti-Semitism.' The series includes: typed transcripts of the 1991 interview with Steen; copies of photos of Steen; copies of secondary sources and citations related to Jewish Ireland and Irish Jewish emigrants; newspaper clippings; Miller's research notes; and Miller's correspondence with Arnold Schrier, colleagues, and librarians.