15,000 people from Valencia emigrated between 1906 and 1920 to Canada and the United States, fleeing poverty to find there the bread and the future they did not have here. Many of them earned enough money to purchase land when they came back and break the dependence on meagre wages. This is one of many conclusions reached by the producer companye InfoTV the last two and half years in the “Del Montgó en Manhattan. Valencianos en New York”, which will lead to a series of four documentaries and a book. The first of these films, “Towards the Promised Land”(93 minutes) projects this Thursday, February 5, at 19:00 in the auditorium of the Cultural Centre La Nau, of the Universitat de València, within the programming of the Debate Forum.
The work, result of careful research conducted over two and a half years, is signed by Juli Esteve, as the screenwriter and director, and Antoni Arnau and Esther Albert, as responsible of image and editing.
Many of these migrants came from the Marina Alta and la Safor, around 8,000 and 2,000, respectively. The remaining 5,000, from la Marina Baja, el Alcoià, el Comtat, la Ribera, la Vall d'Albaida, la Costera, la Plana and Rincón de Ademuz, although migrants were detected in almost all Valencian regions. Although some stayed forever, most returned as a result of the two economic crises in the United States, the post-war of 1921 and the Great Depression that began with the 'crash' of Wall Street in October 1929.
The work first highlights for the figures. It began in 2012 with a thorough review of the passenger lists of thousands of ships arrived in the United States and Canada from Spanish ports between 1900 and 1920 and the French and British ports between late 1919 and late 1920. This is how they could discern 15,589 entries of Valencian migrants. With this list, InfoTV invited 100 municipal councils where there were more than 20 migrants to participate in the project. Either directly or with the support of the Regional Government of Valencia, fifty municipalities were incorporated, allowing locate some 700 children, grandchildren, nephews and great-grandchildren of migrants, who were interviewed individually. The contact with these people allowed to scan around 10,000 photographies, and documents relating to migrants. We have also listed 500 objects related to this phenomenon. Finally, 150 informants were selected to be recorded, here and in the US, with microphone and camera, and become the main characters of the four films.
The work has been supported by 50 organizations and institutions such as the Institute for Regional Studies of the Marina Alta, the Regional Government of Valencia, Valencian Academy of the Language, the Universities of Alicante and Valencia, the CEIC Alfons el Vell, Gandia, the company Rolser and a list of 37 city councils, headed by Pego, Pedreguer, Denia, Orba, Oliva, Javea, Tàrbena, el Verger, Murla, Ondara, Jalon and Villalonga, cited in descending order in the numbers of migrants.
A migration especially of men
Documentaries tell that this was, above all, an emigration of men. But there are also villages like Pego, Murla and Pedreguer, where women who left were between 10 and 20 percent of the total. Valencia settled mainly in New York, city and state, and Connecticut, which is the Valencian state of America.
At first, they worked primarily in the construction and maintenance of railways and roads. And in the coal mines of Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio But they tried to look for more regular and endurable jobs in the textile or metallurgical factories of the American’s West Coast.
Last update: 4 de february de 2015 10:03.
News release
