engleski

Emigration from Dalmatia to the USA at the turn of the 20th century

The Republic of Croatia is a traditional emigrational country, and one of the most important emigrational periods was between 1890 and 1924. Emigration from Croatia was a part of a large emigrational flow to overseas countries that consisted of the surplus of European agricultural population. The most important push factors were grapevine pest (phylloxera), agrarian crisis, insolvency of the peasants, etc. On the other hand, the most significant pull factor was intensive development of overseas countries, particularly the United States of America. Most of the emigrants were young males, and the most attractive destination of the emigrants was the USA. Dalmatia (Southern Croatia) was particularly affected by emigration in that period. The largest data base that registered immigrants to the USA is the one of Ellis Island Immigration Museum, which is available online. Ellis Island database is a valuable source of information on immigrants to USA, but so far the analysis of Croatian immigrants was not done. Due to importance of emigration from Dalmatia, this paper analyzes the data from the above-mentioned data base regarding immigrants who declared as Dalmatians at the time of immigration to the USA (approximately 25, 000 of them). The analysis includes the origin of the immigrants (i.e. their place of residence before immigrating to USA), year of the arrival, and their age and sex composition. The authors also give a historical preview of emigration from Dalmatia, including the main reasons for emigrating and consequences of emigration on demographic development of the analyzed area. The main aim of the paper is to indicate which parts of Dalmatia were mostly affected by emigration and how that emigration affected the development of that area.

emigration; Dalmatia; USA; Ellis Island; economic crisis

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