The Regions of the United States The Northeast

The regions of the US: the Northeast, the Central Basin, the Southeast, the Great Plains.

A NEW ERA, A NEW MISSION

When President Lyndon Johnson merged Ellis Island with the nearby Statue of Liberty National Monument in 1965, Ellis Island was to enter a new era, to embark on new mission. During the years that followed, almost all public access to the island was limited. Then, in 1984, The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, with the cooperation of the National Park Service, requested donations from mainstream and corporate America to fund a $160 million dollar project that was to become the largest historic restoration in the history of the United States. When renovations were completed six years later, the main building reopened as the Ellis Island Immigration Museum. It has been attracting 2 million visitors a year ever since. The huge success of the Ellis Island Immigration Museum is a remarkable testimonial from Americans who, as they venture into the future, are still looking to recall their past.

One of the outstanding features of the Museum is The American Immigrant Wall of Honor with over 700,000 names nominated by friends and families of immigrants who shared the Ellis Island experience. Another remarkable event this year is the Ellis Island Living Theater with its frequent performances of "Taking a Chance on America: Bela Lugosi’s Ellis Island Story." This 30-minute production, written by playwright and screenwriter Aurorae Khoo, focuses on the Ellis Island experiences of famed actor Bela Lugosi as it depicts the Ellis Island inspection process.

The most acclaimed resource at the museum, however, is the American Family Immigration History Center with public access to the names of 22 million immigrants, crew members and other passengers who arrived in New York between 1892 and 1924. Finding the name of an ancestor is as easy as 1-2-3:

Токарева, с. 19, с. 20, с. 21 и с. 22

The skyscrapers of New York, the steel mills of Pittsburgh, the automobile assembly lines of Detroit — these symbols of industrial America belong to this region. This is the place often called the "melting pot" — the fusion of people from many nations into Americans. It was a gateway to the rest of the land.

The settlers had to give up many of the traditional behaviour patterns of Europe when they arrived and to adapt to the new circumstances. Generations of exasperated farmers in New England complained that the chief product of their land is stones. But the very rockiness of the soil was a great aid to industry. In the mountains and hills of New England rocks created numerous waterfalls that could be harnessed for water power.

There are still areas of true wilderness, such as the forests on the northern part of the State of Maine, where to this day the only way of crossing great stretches of land or water is by foot or canoe. Everywhere, the outer reaches of cities mingle with farms, and in many towns there are old farmhouses and barns, changed into dwellings, now crowded close by taller buildings.

The greatest part of America's industry depends upon three resources: iron ore from the Lake Superior area, coal from the Allegheny hills of western Pennsylvania and West Virginia, and transportation across the Great Lakes. Steelmaking is basic, but there are many other related industries in this area too — glass, nonferrous metals, chemicals, rubber, and machinery.

Pittsburgh, in the heart of coal fields, was the first of the great steel cities. Today, the Pittsburgh area still produces about one-fifth of the nation's steel, and also ships coal to the other great steelmaking centers — Chicago, Detroit, Toledo, Cleveland, Buffalo, etc.

Several of the cities on the Great Lakes grew up first as grain-milling centers, and even today grain is a major cargo of the Lakes freighters. Detroit, the heart of the automobile industry, began as a wagonmaking town using wood from the forests that covered the peninsula between Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. An almost unbelievable quantity of freight is carried across the Great Lakes, and most of the shipments are raw materials. The cargo tonnage which passes between Lake Superior and Lake Huron is approximately equal to the combined capacity of the Panama and Suez Canals.

Today, four of the most heavily populated areas in the Northeast are centered around the seaports of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. These four cities are not only important ports, but leading industrial centers.

Дата добавления: 2015-04-24