Arab-Americans Discover Forefathers in Little Syria
Since the uprisings, more Syrians are arriving in the United States and finding that they have a long and rich history in New York City.
When Carl Antoun, a young Lebanese-American, had bugged his grandmother enough times about her past, she directed him to a long-abandoned closet in their basement in New York.
“There was this steamer trunk, and on the side of it was written: '1662 Washington St.' I opened it and found hundreds of pictures, documents and postcards, all perfectly preserved,” Antoun recalled.
He had unearthed part of the lost history of Little Syria, the first Arab-American neighborhood established in the 1880s. Located near the site of ground zero in lower Manhattan, the first wave of immigrants from the Ottoman Empire lined Washington Street with new businesses, newspapers, and music and literary studios.
The grandfather of Antoun’s 94-year-old grandmother had arrived in New York from Lebanon in 1890, setting up a business that imported silk, jewelry and dry goods from Latin America through the nearby New York docks.
