The United States of America has been coined the “land of opportunities” for hundreds of years, a cliché that both spurred and caused vast surges in immigration. Even as far back as the 19^th century, the United States had a reputation of welcoming tides of hopeful newcomers— the land of opportunities.  Mexico and Russia have always provided a good proportion of those newcomers.  The 2000 census reported a population of 20,640,711 people of Mexican origins living in the country, and 2,652,214 Russians.  It’s clear that there is a much larger Mexican population in this country, and there probably always will be, but there is also a much greater distance from the United States.  Considering how much harder it is to get to America from Russia, the huge differences make a lot of sense.  Despite that, both countries’ immigration patterns to the States are great testaments to how much of a staple this country has been for providing people with new life and new prospects.

The reason this country is so diverse today is that for over a century now, the immigrants pouring into the United States have hailed from every type of culture.  Mexico and Russia are two perfect contrasting examples of this.  The people in those countries had very different problems in the 19th century, and they still do now: different forms of leadership, different economic hardships, different roots of oppression, different reasons for wanting to leave.  And yet, immigration from both of those countries showed a strong preference of the United States of America.  The flow of new residents increased consistently from 1880 to 2000, according to the New York Times’ “Immigration Explorer.”

However, there are interesting differences that play into the pattern of almost polar variances between Russia and Mexico.  19^th and 20^th century emigration from Russia was the result of anti-Semitism, with many Eastern European Jews looking for an escape from the prejudices and a better life.  The early Mexican immigration in the U.S was in response for the demand of labor.  All of those immigrants were laborers who were brought into the country for cheap wages and bad conditions.  Another disparity between the two countries’ immigration trend is geographical. The exact opposite happened in Mexico, with immigrant habitation starting out on the west coast and approaching the east as the years passed.

With these geographic patterns came corresponding patterns in the concentration of immigrants in each area.  Russian immigration displays a pattern of fluctuation in rates throughout time.  Within the 20^th century, Russian immigration increased and reached a peak between the years 1910 and 1950, and tapered off slowly for the rest of the century.  In 2000, there seemed to be another surge.  Mexican immigration, however is a slightly different story.  The rates steadily increased throughout time, with the numbers for the year 2000 being the largest recorded.

Russian immigration surged in early 20^th century. The 1910s was the largest influx of Russian immigration to the United States.  They concentrated mainly on the east coast of the U.S. and most Russians settled in Manhattan, New York, Brooklyn, New York, and Cook County, Illinois.  To be exact, there were 312,985 Russians in Manhattan, 160,596 in Brooklyn and 128,369 in Cook County.  Immigrants from Russia arrived at the east coast in the early 20^th century and that’s where the Russian population was mostly concentrated.  As time progressed, they moved further west and spread out throughout the entire nation.

Mexican immigration has been increasing gradually over the 60 years, since the 1950s.  In 2000, which the data in the “Immigration Explorer” reaches, displays the greatest number of Mexican immigrants in the country.  The most are located in Los Angeles County, California, with 1,525,157 Mexican immigrants.  The whole west coast of the United States contains Mexicans, but they are also in South-western United States, mainly in Dallas County and Harris County in Texas.  The populations born in Mexico are 295,678 and 395,459, respectively.  Lastly, another large amount of Mexican immigrants is in Cook County, Illinois, where Russian immigrants used to settle, and in 2000 there are 430,156 immigrants from Mexico there.

The message from all of this data is representative of immigration in the United States of America as a whole.  Despite the differences in rates and time between different immigrant origins, there is a strong history of people coming here that shows no signs of stopping.

One of the largest groups of immigrants that have come to the United States was from Germany.  In fact, up until the 20^th century, German immigration was increasing, albeit slightly.  A majority of these immigrants had always been poor farmers who would eventually settle in the south. However, as seen using the immigration explorer tool, much of this changed in the 20th century as immigration from Germany started to decline slowly.  This decline continued for the next few decades as political tensions in Europe, especially in Germany, rose.

Pre-WWII Germany became a very oppressive environment for the Jewish population.  Under the Nazi Party’s 25 Point Program, Jews were segregated from the “Aryan” population and could not participate in the simplest of tasks, such as going to schools or universities.   This, in turn, had a direct effect on German immigration to the U.S.  During the 1930’s and early 1940’s, a new group of immigrants started coming to America.  About 80% of these immigrants were Jewish.  Furthermore, a significant percentage of the immigrants (both Jews and non-Jews) were intellectuals, a group that had never before come to the U.S. in such large numbers.  In addition, these immigrants, unlike their predecessors, came to the U.S. and settled in cities, further emphasizing the deviation from earlier immigration patterns.

The intellectuals who settled in cities played significant roles in the U.S. during the World War II.  One of the most famous of these figures, perhaps, was Albert Einstein, a German-Jew who, at the time of the war, worked on the Manhattan Project (which allowed the U.S. to develop the first Atomic Bomb).  Similarly, Marlene Dietrich, a German-American actress, toured the states raising war bonds, being one of the first celebrities ever to do so.

During the war, President Franklin D. Roosevelt would also appoint two prominent Americans of German descent to top commands in the Army and Navy, General Dwight D. Eisenhower in Europe and Admiral Chester Nimitz in the Pacific. In fact, General Eisenhower would later become the 34^th president of the U.S.  Clearly, the influx of German immigrants not only affected American society, but also the outcome of the war.  Despite the slow rate of immigration during WWII, German influence in America remained strong.

German immigration may be on a slight decline for now, but past immigrants have fused well with countless other ethnic groups in modern day America.  Influences such as German pubs, Catholics, Lutherans, and craftsmen have all been incorporated into American society.  All in all, German immigrants remain the largest ethnic group in the United States, with over 45 million having made their way to the U.S. in the past couple of centuries.  As a result of this, German-Americans, comprising more than a fourth of the white population, have effectively assimilated into American culture all the while preserving their traditions while adapting to new ones to this very day.