Ellis Island museum strives to tell the stories of all immigrants - even those from Asia

If you’re a white guy on a tourist ferry in New York Harbour, and the Statue of Liberty looms above, it’s easy to see her as the foremost symbol of immigration in the United States, perhaps in the world. You look at her face, then you glance at the ferry’s next stop - Ellis Island, where more than 12 million European immigrants arrived between 1892 and 1924.

Without those huddled incoming masses and their sons and daughters, the US wouldn’t be what it is.

But every year, this immigrant history and America’s population drift a little farther apart. These days, about seven Latin Americans and Asians become US citizens for every one European.

The easiest and most rewarding way to see what’s happening with immigration — and remind yourself about what was happening 100 years ago - may be to get off the ferry at Ellis Island and step into the first big brick building you see.

The Ellis Island National Museum of Immigration was expanded last year to look more broadly at “the peopling of America”. The new wing examines immigration since federal officials declared Ellis Island surplus property in 1954. The museum added the “national” to its name last year, too.

“People were saying, ‘This is a great museum, but my story is not told here,’ ” says Peg Zitko, executive vice president of the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, which raised US$20 million to pay for the museum revamp. “We’re really finally telling the entire story ... There’s really no other museum in America that does that.”