Fifteen years after the museum's opening, more than 30 buildings on Ellis Island await restoration. (Larry Racioppo, Save Ellis Island)

Every year two million people, mostly tourists visiting the Big Apple, pay homage to Ellis Island, the central arrival station for more than 12 million immigrants who sailed to America throughout the late 19th century well into the first half of the 20th century. After a crowded boat ride, they marvel at the Main Building's polished Guastavino-tiled ceiling and read the 600,000 immigrant names etched smoothly on the island's Wall of Honor. They peer at trunks, shoes, and other artifacts and search the history center's passenger records for ancestors who may have first set foot on American soil via the 27-acre island. What they don't see, however, is the island's south side, where 29 buildings sit in varying states of decay.

The complex, a mix of Beaux-Arts and neoclassical structures designed by the Manhattan firm Boring & Tildon, has received virtually no maintenance since the island was declared federal surplus property and closed in 1954 (and some buildings were abandoned even before the 1950s). Today, the maze of abandoned administration buildings, hospitals, and contagious-disease wards is only beginning to recover from decades of neglect and vandalism.

Since the Main Building has been open to the public for 15 years, some might wonder why half of the island is still in poor condition. Plans to restore the entire island have been in the works since the 1980s. The success of the six-year, $162 million restoration of the Main Building has helped pave the way for more preservation work, but a number of factors, including a change in the administration, September 11, and the ever-present shortage of money, have prevented more progress.

A fading of public awareness and concern about the ongoing project is also an issue, according to Judith McAlpin, president of Save Ellis Island, the group that took over fundraising for the south side's restoration in 2000.

"We always get the biggest reaction from people seeing the buildings in their most precarious state," McAlpin says. "There is this idea of a romantic ruin that people find appealing, but it's too bad because we don't want to have to keep buildings in their worst condition to get people's attention."

Hospital exterior (Larry Racioppo)

One structure in its worst condition is the Baggage and Dormitory Building—so much so that it made the World Monuments Fund's 2006 list of the world's 100 most endangered sites. (Ellis Island was on the National Trust's list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places in 1992.) Located on the less deteriorated north side of the island, this structure is the one building that has not yet undergone any stabilization work.

Project Supervisor Don Fiorino, who worked on the island's first restoration from 1986 to 1991, says the building looks the same as it did back then. "Because of its location, it receives all the wind, rain, and elements coming down from the Hudson."

Built between 1908 and 1913, the building served as a storage facility for immigrant's belongings and housed people waiting to leave the island. Its walls are still decorated with graffiti added when the structure became a detention center for suspected illegal immigrants in the 1930s, and a long-forgotten playground spans the roof. While the dormitory may need more work than most of the other buildings, architectural assessments have indicated that it isn't beyond repair. "The bones of the building are still good," Fiorino says, noting that it's the exterior that needs the work. "It's just a matter of addressing the envelope."

Hospital operating room (Larry Racioppo)

While every building provides different restoration challenges like asbestos, lead paint, and contaminated debris, Fiorino says water has been the island's main enemy. Because the original 3.3-acre island was expanded by landfill, "rising damp"—the absorption of water upwards into walls and brick—has been a problem. "Moisture just permeates the buildings," Fiorino says, adding that the first step towards restoration is getting the structures dried out.

The south side is slowly coming to life again. All but one of the south side's 29 buildings has been stabilized, and workers are now beginning the exterior restorations. The c. 1900-1901 Laundry and Hospital Outbuilding's exterior is being restored, and the collapsed roof of its c. 1920 laundry annex has been replaced. The building's interior still has far to go, however. As a living quarters for Ellis Island employees, it was also the laundry services and the morgue (3,500 people died on Ellis Island).

"There are some fabulous artifacts in the building," says Darcy Hartman, director of education and public programs at Save Ellis Island. Still there is the original spin dryer, an industrial washing machine, and a "laundry mangle."

Another building well on its way to restoration, thanks in part to a $1.15 million Save America's Treasures grant, is the Ferry Building, which has undergone a two-year exterior restoration and interior stabilization. Built in 1935 after the original wood Victorian structure burned down, the Ferry Building was a place all immigrants hoped to visit. If they passed the rigorous inspection process and were declared fit for American citizenship, the Ferry Building served as a "jumping off point" for future destinations: 30 percent of immigrants headed to New York City, while the other 70 percent departed for the New Jersey railroads, which would take them across the country. It was also a meeting spot where family members already in the country could greet their newly arrived relatives. While the interior still needs some restoration, tourists will be able to visit the structure for the first time next year, when the island's first exhibit focusing on its hospitals is showcased in the building.

(Larry Racioppo)

Another crucial restoration project is a corridor connecting the Ferry Building and the Laundry and Hospital Outbuilding, as well as some other structures. A rehabbed corridor will enable easier access to the island's south side, allowing more visitors to see some of the closed buildings.

Save Ellis Island envisions turning the island's south side into not just another set of museums but the Ellis Island Institute and Conference Center, an education complex that addresses today's immigration challenges. Many of the same issues—discrimination and poverty, faced by Irish and Italians 100 years ago—are recurring for Mexican and South American immigrants. "This history here can help us," McAlpin says. "We want to round out the visitor experience of what Ellis Island was all about by tying it to issues of immigration today."

Much of the construction currently under way is stabilization work to ensure that the complex can be saved. While the island's entire restoration is far from finished, visitors can glimpse its future through events such as the Ellis Island Institute Teacher's Seminar, held for the first time in July.

Most New Yorkers never visit the island, McAlpin points out. "They'll admit sheepishly, 'Well, I've never been out there' or 'I've already seen it.'" She hopes the transformation of the island into a conference center will change that. "I want this place to become so vital that people say, 'Well, I wonder what's on the schedule for Ellis Island this year.'"

Sign up for our free weekly e-newsletter >>

Recent Stories