ELLIS ISLAND.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 24, 28 December 1925, Page 7

ELLIS ISLAND.

INTERNATIONAL MINGLING. COLOURFUL CHRISTMAS REVELS NEW YORK, Dec. 25. There were colourful international Christmas celebrations when more than 500 immigrants, men, women and children, gathered for recreation at the foot of Ellis Island and received gifts and listened to music and songs in many tongues, after which they feasted.

The audience included lalians, Africans from tho Sahara, the Gold Coast, Slovak peasant women wearing voluminous skirts, red ’kerchiefs and boots, Chinese, Irishmen, Jews from Bethlehem, Spanish senoritas with high combs in their hair, and a group of pretty Japanese geisha girls. The majority of the immigrants were those who had been detained for various reasons for from a weekly to three months, but they included over 100 deportees, whose faces lighted up at the songs and became sad again when tho music ended.

A musical programme at the sick immigrants’ hospital preceded the main entertainment. Six children were present through invitation, having enjoyed tho island play facilities so much when previously detained they wanted to return to participate in the Christmas party.—A. and N.Z. cable.