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“THE NEw MECCA OF IMMIGRANTS”...
THE ROLE OF IMMIGRATION BOOSTER LITERATURE
AND ANTI-EMIGRATION RESPONSES
As already noted, early Hungarian government measures concerning
emigration targeted the activities of immigration agents largely because
these played a major role in the propagation of migration in various parts
of Hungary. The diverse propaganda materials, booklets, pamphlets, posters,
etc. presented both the United States and Canada as attractive destinations
for emigrants, with “news of prospects in America spread[ing] rapidly even
to the most remote villages in Hungary. Literature promoting emigration was
widely disseminated and dozens of agents representing competing companies
travelled through the countryside to recruit immigrants.”** The positive
images propagated in these publications were often reinforced by the letters
(and money) sent by migrants to the home country, in which they often
reported on high wages and great opportunities, while they tended to remain
silent on possible hardships and failures. The Hungarian government tried
to counteract these (often overtly positive) accounts by informing would-be
immigrants of the risks they would be taking and the dangers they might
face. This meant drawing attention to challenges related to the trans¬
Atlantic voyage itself, harsh and often abusive treatment, the lowly status
designated to immigrants, dangerous jobs, and a sense of loneliness and
homesickness, among other issues. However, as Tibor Glant argues, people
tended “to disbelieve their government, although it was telling the truth, and
accepted at face value what their relatives and fellow villagers told them about
the New World, although these accounts were blatantly one-sided.”?”
Such propaganda activities and immigration agents also played a key role
in the case of Canada and Hungarians. We can find immigration booster
materials already in connection with the first Hungarian settlements created
under the supervision of Esterhazy, Canada advertised the Western provinces
all over Europe as the “Last Best West” at the turn of the century, while
during the 1920s agents of the Canadian railway companies tried to lure
Hungarians to the country in various ways. In the following, I provide an
overview of these activities, mostly in relation to Hungarians, providing key
examples, and analyzing in more detail an attempt from the 1920s to counter
such pro-immigration activities. Immigration agents and their materials
often remained silent on real challenges related to the Canadian climate and
difficulties due to the lack of speaking English or resulting from the huge
36 Patrias, Hungarians in Canada, 3.
” Tibor Glant, Travel Writing as a Substitute for American Studies in Hungary, Hungarian
Journal of English and American Studies, Vol. 16, No. 1-2 (2010), 176.
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