Annie Moore, the First Immigrant Through Ellis Island

American Catholic History

Noelle & Tom Crowe

Religion & Spirituality, History, Christianity, Education

5 • 724 Ratings

🗓️ 8 January 2026

⏱️ 22 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Ellis Island opened on January 1, 1892, and the first immigrant to be welcomed was Annie Moore, who was either a 15 or 17 year-old Catholic girl from Ireland. She and her younger brothers traveled over from Cobh, County Cork to join their parents who were already in American. Moore went on to marry a German and have a bunch of kids in New York City, contrary to some popular myths. Twelve million immigrants passed through Ellis Island during its 62 years of service, most of them from historically Catholic countries. Ellis Island was the first central immigration point set up by the federal government after nearly 100 years of immigration being controlled by the states.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to American Catholic History brought to you by the support of listeners like you.
0:11.1	If you like our podcast, please become a supporter.
0:14.5	Also, please be sure to rate us and give us a review wherever you get your podcasts.
0:20.1	I'm Noelle Heister Crow.
0:21.2	And I'm Tom Crow.
0:22.4	Today we're talking about Annie Moore, the Catholic Irish teen, who was the first immigrant
0:28.6	to be processed at Ellis Island.
0:30.7	Now, I need to say at the outset that the factoid that this topic is based on came to
0:34.9	me in a fantastic song, Isle of Hope, Isle of Tears, written by
0:38.9	Irish songwriter Brendan Graham. My favorite performance is by the Irish tenors. The first
0:45.0	lines of the song are, on the first day of January 1892, they opened Ellis Island and
0:51.3	they let the people through. The first to cross the threshold of the Isle
0:55.2	of Hope and Tears was Annie Moore from Ireland, who was all of 15 years. Now, there is some
1:02.0	question about her actual age. Family lore says she was actually 17 when she came over, but that
1:07.9	she lied about her age to get a cheaper fare on the ship.
1:16.0	But regardless, the lyrics of the song are about as heart-wrenching and heart-warming as you might expect.
1:17.3	Deep longing for Ireland, despite the pain that was experienced there.
1:22.0	Trepidation and hope about the future in this new land.
1:25.1	It's a lovely song.
1:26.1	We'll link to the album at our show notes.
1:27.8	But yes, that opening just screams for a story to be told. So here we are.
1:33.0	Yeah. Well, let's be honest. You don't need much to find a story to tell. Hey, it's life.
	...

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