Ellis Island Retrospective

Ellis Island Retrospective (series) embodies the photographer's interest in early 20th century immigration and her own personal ancestry. A few images are blended into each entry in this series. The predominant background image in each collage was taken by the photographer in the Ellis Island hospital wing in 2024. It was then overlaid with a combination of primary source documents that were printed, aged and photographed (census records, ship manifests, newspapers, etc) as well as archival digital photos that are in the public domain and found through the Library of Congress. This series is inspired by photographer's genealogy research and love of history. Each image strives to tell a story of what an early 20th century immigrant might have seen and experiences while traveling through New York in search of The American Dream.