Hi, I am a student at Washington State University, and have been assigned to do an oral presentation on Portuguese in America. I was told by my professor that people on this forum may be a great source of information. I'd appreciate any input. Here are some things I am looking for: When and why did the bulk of Portuguese emigrate? What do Portuguese do to maintain their identity in the United States? Have the Portuguese undergone any harsh pdistrust of prejudice in the US? Are there any athletes, politicians, actors, or other notable Portuguese that the Portuguese people honor? Do Portuguese live, worship, invest, etc. together? Any information would really help me out a lot; it doesn't even have to be about the above questions. My presentation is due tomorrow morning (yes, short notice!). Thanks. -Dan P.
well then you will have alot of info by tommorow as for the last question do we live invest i like to think that we do but other posters here are more history prone with more knowledge
Very short notice guy! We'll try to help and BTW your teacher is right about this being a great source of information: Most Portuguese came over in the 60s, 70s and 80s. I believe there was a dropoff in immigration in the 90s (possibly because of Portugal's integration with the European Union). Most Portuguese live in the NorthEast ( Newark, NJ was and is a favorite; Fall River, MAssachusetts has a lot of Azorean (from the Portuguese island of Azores) has tons of Portuguese. New Bedford, MA and Danbury and Bridgeport, CT are full of Portuguese. Most are learning to retire to Florida, specially in a relatively new town called Palm Coast. What do Portuguese do to maintain their identity in the United States? For one: SOCCER, the Portuguese league makes people come together every weekends (games are on TV) also Portuguese restaurants blossom wherever they open (very good food at affordable prices), Portuguese bakeries w/ their delicacies become popular wherever they open. Portuguese people love to back to Portugal on vacation during the summer to visit their families (we are very attached)... There is also one major event: Portugal Day festivities in some of the above mentioned cities where Newark draws some 200,000 people around the June 10th weekend (local and state politicians love to be seen in the Sunday afternoon parade ). Have the Portuguese undergone any harsh pdistrust of prejudice in the US? If you see prejudice it would be between Spanish and Portuguese in Newark and Portuguese and Italians in Toronto. American people love Portuguese people because they know we are hard-working people and very good at what we do... more to come later, perhaps the guys will help out too
If you take the time to read some of the Archived threads you will find a wealth of information... Most of the questions you asked have been discussed on this board...just use the search feature... Good Luck.. By the way...Abraham Lincoln was of Portuguese Ancestry... Get the book...."The Portuguese Making of America" loads of information...
I'm sorry that I don't have more time to answer your questions, but I'll try and give you as much as I can right now. There were generally 2 large "waves" of emigration by Portuguese. The 1st wave came at the tail end of the 19th century and lasted into about the 1920s. The largest segment of the people who came over were fishermen or people who worked in the fishing industry. They tended to migrate to areas where the fishing industry was booming - i.e. Southeast New England (New Bedford, Fall River, Provincetown), Hawaii and California (San Fran). The majority of these people were Azorean. By the 1910-20s, more and more people came looking for non-fishing jobs. Most of these people came from the mainland and were in search of construction or unskilled work that would provide a better life for their families than they were getting in Portugal. These people tended to concentrate in industrial areas in the Northeast US (Boston, Lowell, NYC, Newark, Providence). The onset of the Great Depression and tightened US immigration laws led to significant decline in Portuguese immigration. the US government instituted a "quota system" that proportionally allocated entry visas to various countries. However, the system was weighted in such a way that Southern Europeans received very few visas compared with, say, Ireland or UK. Case in point, my grandfather first applied for a visa in 1945 and didn't receive one until 1959! The second wave of Portuguese immigrants was triggered by a Volcanic explosion and a series of earthquakes in the Azores in the 1950s and 1960s. Spearheaded by then Senator John F. Kennedy, Congress passed the Azorean Refugee Act of 1958 which opened the door for many Portuguese, both Azorean and from the mainland, to enter the US. The majority of these people joined family members who were already here or settled in Industrial areas that had significant Portuguese populations. Most of these immigrants settled in areas like Newark or greater Boston where they could work in the industrial factories. By the late 1970s, immigration started to tail off and further diminished once Portugal entered the EU in 1986.
Because of the amount of Portuguese who settled in California or Massachusetts in the 19th and 20th centuries, there are a number of famous people who are 2nd/3rd/4th generation Portuguese. A lot of them might not recognize their roots, but they do have Portuguese blood. Off the top of my head, here are a couple examples: Tom Hanks Tony Coelho - former Democratic Congressmen from Cali. and head of the Democratic Party. Billy Martin - former Yankee/A's manager Billy Goncalves - One of the greatest US soccer players. Played for the US at the 1930 World Cup. The first famous Portuguese-American, though, was Peter Francisco. He was brought to Viriginia as a child in the 18th century. When he grew up, he fought in the Revolutionary War and was known for his incredible strength and bravery. Hell, he even got himself on a stamp in 1975. Here are some links on him for you: http://www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/portam/pfrancisco.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Francisco
Billy Andrade- Pro Golf player Meredith Vieira- The View and Who Wants 2 be a millionaire? Joaquim de Almeida- was and has been in alot of movies Mark Teixeira- the name is as Portuguese as it gets (no confirmation of his Portuguesenism) Davey Lopes- former star w/ LA Dodgers and I think he still coaches somewhere Teresa Heinz-Kerry- John Kerry's wife
Portuguese, undoutedly, left Portugal, to seek opportunities and a better life. The Portuguese, all across North America, are very proud of their heritage. They have close-knit communities and celebrate religious festivals and feasts...Portugal Day, Festival of Saint Anthony(St. Anthony was Portuguese by the way), Festival of Mother Mary, etc. I think Portuguese received the same amount of Prejiduce other immigrant populations received, especially during the first initial immigrations. As North America became more and more diverse, so has people's attitudes. New York is a great example, where Jewish, Polish, Italian, Spanish, Russian, even Portuguese intermingled, intermarried, and co-existed. Principally, when the first Portuguese immigrants came to North America, they worked as fishermen, in bakery's, in textile plants, in construction, and other unskilled trades, just as most new settlers did. A take what you can get approach - nonetheless a proud hard working people. Are there Portuguese American athletes, musicians, actors, or other notable Portuguese. Well, for starters, there was a Portuguese baseball player who played for the Detroit Tigers - Viveiros. There's Billy Andrade, a great Pro golfer. As far as Musicians go - Nuno Bettencourt was the lead guitarist from Extreme - a band that churned out numerous hits. The Author Danielle Steele, who writes Romance Novels, is Portuguese as well. The lead Actress' Piper Parabo from the movie Coyote Ugly is Porguguese on her dad's side, as is model Brooke Burke, the host of Wild ON. Also, as was mentioned, TV personalities, Meredith Vieira, host of Who wants to be a Millionaire and the View is as Portuguese as her lastname, as is Chef and TV host Emerille Legasse, who as a Portuguese mother. Another great actress Vanessa Marcil is also Portuguese - she is best remembered for being the lead actress on Days of Our Lives, and starring opposite Nicholas Cage and Sean Connery in 'The Rock'. It's also been proven, but may be debated that people like Tom Hanks and Abraham Lincoln, who are relatives, come from Portuguese immigrant lineage, as well as Al Gore, as many Portuguese settled in that area. Another key Portuguese figure is of course Teresa Heinze Kerry, John Kerry's wife...who is 100% Portuguese, born in Mozambique Africa, and later becoming a US citizen.
one of the strongest things the portuguese have done to keep their identity is to bring over their strong family structure, its very common for the grandparents to be as involved if not more in a childs life than the parents, its allso not uncommon that childhood best friends are not neighboors and school mates but cousins. Relegion plays a huge role to as alot of festivals and feasts were we congregate revolve around religous meanings, as for investment in my neighboorhodd their is a portuguese credit union who have given loans to people who maybe wouldnt get one anywhere else, also you need a carpenter you find a portuguese person your family knows, mechanic same thing, alot of times they keep it within the community without bein xenophibic like other immigrant cultures, man I wish I had more time as well as you as this is a very interesting subject. good luck tommororw mate. heres a funny webiste with alot of truths though http://www.portcult.com/ http://www.islander-magazine.com/port.html http://collections.ic.gc.ca/magic/mt58.html http://wwwlibrary.csustan.edu/bsantos/azorean.html just some immigration links for you once again good luck and its nice to see portugal geting attention id buy you a beer
Very interesting stuff. Roughly, how many portuguese in the US? I know in Canada it's something like over 500 000 with Greater Toronto having over 200 000.
It's got to be more then 500 000, London alone has over 40 000, i think when u include Hamilton, Kitchener, Cambridge, Montreal, Winnipeg, Vancouver and Chatam and Windsor area, i would guess well over half million!
From what I can find, there are roughly over 2,000,000 Portuguese-American citizens or Portuguese residents in the US.
It sounded a bit high to me, as well. But I did get it off the PALCUS website (Portuguese American Leadership Council). You have to take into account that there are a much greater number of 2nd/3rd generation descendents in the US than there are in Canada.
My presentation went quite well. Thanks a lot for the information, the personal accounts and web sites were quite valuable, and added a great sence of first-handedness to my presentation. Just thought I'd let everyone know how it went!
I think 2million sounds about right. I mean there are heavy Portuguese populations in Massachussets, New York, N.J., California...and I'm sure there are Portuguese sprinkled all over the U.S. like in Texas, Florida, Michigan etc.
No kidding. I grew up in Massachusetts and I think every other person I knew was Portuguese. My best friend of 20 years has a father who was born in Madeira.
florida does have a small portuguese community but mostly latinos bit the gta i think has the masses for sure even in boston we are establishing everywhere thats good to see