First Encounters

I.1Martin the Armenian and Colonial Virginia

The first Armenian recorded in North America arrived at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1618. Known in colonial records as Martin (or Malcolm) the Armenian, he was an Iranian Armenian tobacco grower who settled in the young English colony, only eleven years after its founding.^[1]

A generation later, in 1653–1654, two Armenians from Constantinople were invited to Virginia to raise silkworms, part of the colony's efforts to develop a silk industry.^[1] These early arrivals were few, but they show that Armenian skills and commercial networks reached the Atlantic world very early.

I.2American Missionaries in the Armenian Highlands

The most important American link to Armenians in the 19th century ran in the opposite direction, from New England to the Ottoman Empire. The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) was founded in Boston in 1810 and began opening schools across Ottoman lands after 1820.^[2]

Because missionaries were barred from converting Muslims, they focused much of their educational work on the Ottoman Armenian population.^[3] Over the following decades, the ABCFM network grew from kindergartens and primary schools to a series of colleges:^[2]

• American College for Girls, Constantinople (1871)
• Central Turkey College, Aintab (1876)
• Euphrates College, Harput (1878)
• Central Turkey Girls' College, Marash (1880)
• Anatolia College, Marsovan (1886)

These institutions taught English, science and American civic ideals to a generation of Armenian students. They also created the personal and institutional ties that later carried Armenian students, pastors and families to American towns and helped make American missionaries some of the most important witnesses to the catastrophes described in Chapter II.

I.3Christopher Oscanyan and the First Arrivals

In 1835, Hatchik (Christopher) Oscanyan arrived in the United States for higher education. He had studied at an American missionary school in Constantinople. He later worked for the New York Herald Tribune and became president of the New York Press Club, making him one of the first Armenians to gain prominence in American public life.^[1,4]

Oscanyan's path, from a missionary classroom to American journalism, set a pattern. Many later immigrants arrived with an education gained in American-run schools, along with English and professional contacts that eased their entry into American society.

I.4Who Came, and Why

Only a handful of Armenians reached North America before the 19th century. Large-scale Armenian immigration began in the late 1800s, and the American mission network was one of its main channels: Armenian students in mission schools learned English, came to know American institutions, and some traveled to the United States to study, work or train for the ministry.^[2,1]

Most early immigrants came from the Armenian provinces of the Ottoman Empire, from places such as Harput (Kharpert), Van, Bitlis, Mush, Erzurum, Sivas, Aintab, Marash and Cilicia.^[1,4] Many were young men who planned to work for a few years, save money and go home. They found jobs in textile mills, shoe factories, foundries, machine shops, railroads and meatpacking plants, or opened small shops.^[1] Early settlements grew in Worcester and Watertown, Massachusetts; Providence, Rhode Island; New York and northern New Jersey; Philadelphia; Chicago; Detroit; and Fresno, California.^[1,4]

I.5Worcester, Fresno and the First Communities

By the 1880s, Armenian workers were settling in the industrial towns of New England. Worcester, Massachusetts, became the first real center of Armenian American life. In 1891 the Church of Our Savior was consecrated there as the first Armenian church in the United States.^[1] In 1898, Catholicos Mkrtich Khrimian (Khrimian Hayrik) established the American Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church.^[1]

An Armenian press appeared at the same time. The first Armenian-language newspaper in the United States, Arekag, was published in Jersey City in 1888. More than 300 Armenian periodicals have been published in America since then.^[1] On the West Coast, Armenian families began farming in California's San Joaquin Valley. Fresno became the main Armenian center in the West, a community that would later produce William Saroyan and Kirk Kerkorian.^[1]

Key dates

• 1618Martin the Armenian settles at Jamestown, Virginia.^[1]
• 1653–54Two Armenians invited to Virginia to raise silkworms.^[1]
• 1810ABCFM founded in Boston; schools in Ottoman lands follow after 1820.^[2]
• 1835Christopher Oscanyan arrives to study in the U.S.^[1]
• 1888Arekag, the first Armenian newspaper in America, appears in Jersey City.^[1]
• 1891Church of Our Savior, Worcester: the first Armenian church in the U.S.^[1]
• 1898American Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church established.^[1]

I.6Churches, Parties and the First Organizations

Armenian immigrants built institutions quickly. They needed places to worship, learn Armenian, find work, help new arrivals and keep community life together. Churches were far more than places of prayer: they hosted language classes, choirs, youth groups, dances, weddings, funerals, charity drives and political meetings.

The community was religiously diverse. Most Armenian Americans belong to the Armenian Apostolic Church, with Armenian Evangelical (Protestant) and Armenian Catholic minorities, as well as many secular Armenians.^[1] In fact, the first Armenian place of worship in America was evangelical: the Armenian Evangelical Church of Martyrs, founded in Worcester in 1881.^[4]

Political parties followed. The three major Armenian parties, the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), the Social Democrat Hunchakian Party and the Armenakan (later Ramgavar Liberal Democratic) Party, set up branches in the United States soon after they were founded. Each had its own newspapers, among them Hairenik, Asbarez and The Armenian Weekly (ARF), Massis (Hunchak) and Baikar and the Armenian Mirror-Spectator (Ramgavar).^[1,4]

The first Armenian American organizations

• 1881Armenian Evangelical Church of Martyrs, Worcester, the first Armenian place of worship in America.^[4]
• 1886Armenian Union, New York, the first Armenian organization in the U.S.^[4]
• 1888Armenian Academy, Worcester.^[4]
• 1892Armenian Library Union, Fresno.^[4]
• 1908Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) branch established in Boston.^[4]
• 1910Armenian Relief Society, New York.^[4]
• 1916Knights of Vartan, Philadelphia.^[4]

Armenian newspapers reunited separated families, printed job notices, reported world events and kept Armenian-language public life alive. Hundreds of such titles have appeared over the years.^[1]