Jane Maud Campbell
North American Civic League for Immigrants
North American Civic League for Immigrants
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Campbell joined the New York City Committee of the North American Civic League for Immigrants in 1910 as education secretary, working directly with immigrants, helping them with the naturalization process and with employment opportunities as American citizens. They used using ships' manifests at [Ellis Island](/wiki/Ellis_Island "Ellis Island") to compile lists of school\-age children entering New York so that they could be registered for school. Eventually this work was taken over by federal authorities.

During the summer of 1911 as the [Catskill Aqueduct](/wiki/Catskill_Aqueduct "Catskill Aqueduct") was being built, Campbell began visiting [labor camps](/wiki/Labor_camp "Labor camp") along the aqueduct construction route and provided moving pictures with musical accompaniment. These films, which she showed using hints from her father's friend Thomas Edison, gave advice on health and hygiene regulations, state and federal laws, the naturalization process, and technical instruction on aqueduct construction. These were combined with recreational movies on Saturday nights. The experiment went on for three months and reached 7,000 viewers.

She continued her work in immigrant laborer education by creating elementary English lessons based on the words laborers would need to use in their construction jobs. These were published in English/Italian and English/Polish, the most frequently spoken languages. She oversaw the creation of pamphlets explaining concepts such as naturalization requirements, the basic laws of the United States, including child labor and education laws.


Why were elementary English lessons created based on words used in construction jobs?