Greek Immigration Seaphim Canoutas

According to one Greek writer, the first Greek immigrant in the Americas was Christopher Columbus. Seraphim Canoutas spent many years researching his claim that while Columbus may have lived in Italy at the time of his departure for his explorations, he may have been a member of a high ranking Greek family that had gone to Italy from Byzantium (Moskos and Moskos 7). Regardless of the legitimacy of this claim, the first Greek experience in the United States certainly dates to before the time of the greatest wave of immigration from the Greek Islands. Still the numbers of Greeks in the United States remained relatively small until the beginning of the 20th century.

The period of 1900-1910 saw a mass emigration of Greeks to the United States: as many as 167,000 Greeks may have arrived during that decade (Monos 50). This number represented as much as 25% of the work force in Greece at that time (Monos 50). There were many factors that contributed to this influx of Greek people. As was the case for many groups who have migrated to the United States, economic hardship played a role in determining the Greeks’ place in the mass immigration circa 1900. According to Charles Moskos, “the world of the Greek peasant at the turn of the twentieth century was desperately poor. Simply having enough to eat was a constant concern…” Not only was Greece a harsh land in which to thrive, and while fishing and olive farming were major industries, they did not provide a living for all (Moskos 34). In addition, the heated geo-political impact of the Ottoman invasion of the entire Greek-speaking world caused many to flee to safer lands. Greeks faced the usurpation of their land and annihilation of many of their people at the hands of the Ottomans of Tur...

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... the entertainment field, where personalities from singer Maria Callas and actor Telly (Arisotle) Savalas, to actors Tina Fey and Jennifer Aniston, have gained fame and success. Michael Dukakis (2) notes that Greek immigrant parents “sacrificed a lot to make that (college education) possible, and it is not an accident that second- and third- generation Greek Americans achieved some of the highest educational levels of any immigrant group in the United States. These individuals, and those Greek-Americans who live less noteworthy or celebrated public lives, owe much to the Greek immigrants who arrived, struggled and prevailed in the United States during first decade of the 20th century. The numbers of immigrants from Greece declined rapidly in the decades thereafter, but the influence of the wave of Greek Nationals arriving here between 1900-1910 is broad and lasting.