Ellis Island Texas Legend Debunked
Annie Moore has long been recognized as the first immigrant to come through Ellis Island. 15 year-old Annie arrived on a ship from Ireland on January 1, 1892. History then has it that Moore moved West and became a Texan where today a statue in a Dallas park honors her historic journey.
However last week a genealogist produced evidence that Annie Moore lived and died in New York City. Annie never left New York’s Lower East Side. She had at least 11 children, with five of them surviving to adulthood. She herself died at 47, and now lies in an unmarked grave.
When the genealogist realized the Annie Moore in Texas was not the Annie Moore who came through Ellis Island, she went looking for what had happened to Annie from Ireland.
[She] made little progress for a few years, but her search was reinvigorated this year after she moved to southern New Jersey and visited a genealogical exhibition in Philadelphia featuring a 1910 photograph of the Texas Annie. (The photograph might also have been a model for Jeanne Rynhart’s two bronze sculptures, one of which is at Ellis IslandShe posted a challenge on her blog for information about the immigrant Annie Moore. She also mentioned it to Mr. Andersson,(NY Commissioner of Records) who she knew was very interested in genealogy.
With the power of the Internet and a handful of history geeks we cracked this baby in six weeks, she said. Brian found this one document, and we knew we had the right family. We had the smoking gun.
The Annie Moore who became a Texan was actually born in Illinois.
The news left an Irish-culture group in Texas reeling. The Southwest Celtic Music Association dedicated a statue to their Annie Moore last March at the North Texas Irish Festival.It’s too bad we got it wrong, said Jim Miller, the festival’s spokesman. I don’t know what we can do about it now. It’s unfortunate.
A $1,000 reward, offered by Smolenyak as part of her effort, has gone to the real Annie’s great-niece, Patricia Somerstein of Long Beach, N.Y., and Brian Andersson, New York’s commissioner of records.
They plan to spend the money on another memorial for Moore: a headstone for her grave.
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