Three real pieces of American writing, from three different centuries, and one voice that was never written down. Read each one. Then answer the three questions under it: Who wrote it? Who was it for? What kind of writing is it?
1790A letter from the President
George Washington, President of the United States, to the Jewish congregation of Newport, Rhode Island. Written August 18, 1790, the day after they wrote to welcome him to their town. His letter calls them “the Hebrew Congregation”: “Hebrew” was the word people then used for Jewish.
“…the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance…”
The whole sentence: “For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.” (In 1790, “demean themselves” meant “behave.”)
Who wrote it?
Who was it for?
What kind of writing?
1883A poem for a statue
Emma Lazarus, a poet born in New York City, wrote fourteen lines in November 1883 to help pay for the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal. She called the statue “Mother of Exiles.” These are the last five lines. Since 1903 they have been on a bronze plaque at the statue, still on Liberty Island today.
1“Give me your tired, your poor, 2Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 3The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. 4Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, 5I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Who wrote it?
Who is speaking?
What kind of writing?
1915A studio, a voice in pictures
Carl Laemmle, born in 1867 in Laupheim, Germany, arrived in America at seventeen. He ran a nickel movie theater, then made films himself, and in 1915 opened Universal City, a whole town built for making movies. Most of the studios that built Hollywood were founded by Jewish immigrants. This voice is not written down. It is in the movies.
Who built it?
Where did he come from?
What kind of voice?
1918A song the country sings
Irving Berlin, born Israel Beilin in the Russian Empire in 1888. He arrived in New York with his family in 1893, when he was about five, and grew up to write more than a thousand songs.
“God Bless America”
Written in 1918 at an Army camp on Long Island, for a soldiers’ show. Put away in a drawer. Taken out and rewritten in 1938 as a song about peace, and sung on the radio that November by Kate Smith. The words are still under copyright, so they are not printed here. You have probably heard them at a ballgame.
Who wrote it?
Where was he born?
What kind of writing?
A letter · a poem · a studio · a song · 1790 · 1883 · 1915 · 1918
K–5 Lesson