The history of Ellis Island goes on much farther than most people would ever try to think. For instance, it goes back to before the opening of Ellis's immigration screening station. Even before that, it goes back to before the very first immigrants came to this country legally. It wasnt until sometime in the 1600s that the tribe called the Mohegans called Ellis Island, Gull Island, which was only had a mere two or three acres. During high tides, the newly named island could hardly ever been seen over the rising water. it wasnt until some dutch settelers were on the island collecting oysters that they realized how rich this island was for oysters that they changed the name from gull island to oyster island. During 1765, the people of the island had hung Anderson the pirate and again, renamed the island, to gibber island, which was the tool that was used to hang him. Finally, january 20th 1785, Samuel Ellis purched the land and named it, Ellis island
it had gone through several generations of samuel ellis until it was bought and made part of New York in 1804 for ten thousand dollars.in 1876, the united states navy started using ellis island for a munitions depot, which stored 260,000 pounds of powder. However, nearby New Jersey residents demanded for the removal of the depot in 1890, In that same year the commite choose ellis island to house the new immigration screening station.
i learned alot from this research because i didnt really know much of ellis island let alone it was named several other times before being called ellis island. i never knew that it was also were the navy started using it for a munitions depot, or that it was the start of immigration screening.
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