Editing Jacob Riis (section)

===Migration to the United States===
[[File:Jacob Riis portrait.jpg|thumb|Riis {{Circa|1903}}]]
Riis immigrated to America in 1870, when he was 21 years old, seeking employment as a carpenter. He first traveled in a small boat from [[Copenhagen]] to [[Glasgow]], where on May 18 he boarded the steamer ''[[Iowa (steamboat)|Iowa]]'', traveling in [[steerage]]. He carried $40 donated by friends (he had paid $50 for the passage himself); a gold locket with a strand of Elisabeth's hair, presented by her mother; and letters of introduction to the Danish Consul, Mr. Goodall (later president of the [[American Bank Note Company]]), a friend of the family since his rescue from a shipwreck at Ribe.<ref>Alland, p. 17; Ware pp. 14, 17–18.</ref>
Riis disembarked in New York on June 5, on that day spending half of the $40 his friends had given him on a revolver for defense against human or animal predators.<ref>Alland, p. 19.</ref>

When Riis arrived in New York City, he was one of a large number of migrants and immigrants, seeking prosperity in a more industrialized environment, who came to urban areas during the years after the [[American Civil War]]. Twenty-four million people relocated to urban areas, causing their population to increase eightfold.<ref name="mirror" /> The demographics of American urban areas became significantly more heterogeneous as many immigrants arrived, creating ethnic enclaves often more populous than many of the cities of their homelands.<ref name="mirror">James Davidson and Mark Lytle, "The Mirror with a Memory", ''After the Fact: The Art of Historical Detection'' 4th ed. (New York: McGraw Hill, 2000; {{ISBN|0-07-229426-4}}).</ref> "In the 1880s 334,000 people were crammed into a single square mile of the [[Lower East Side]], making it the most densely populated place on earth. They were packed into filthy, disease-ridden tenements, 10 or 15 to a room, and the well-off knew nothing about them and cared less."<ref>[[Robert Hughes (critic)|Robert Hughes]], ''American Visions''</ref>

After five days, during which he used almost all his money, Riis found work as a carpenter at Brady's Bend Iron Works on the [[Allegheny River]] above [[Pittsburgh]]. After a few days of that, he began mining for increased pay but quickly resumed carpentry. Learning on July 19, 1870, that France had [[Franco-Prussian War|declared war on Germany]], he expected that Denmark would join France to avenge the Prussian [[Second Schleswig War|seizure of Schleswig]], and determined to fight for France. He returned to New York, and, having pawned most of his possessions and without money, attempted to enlist at the French consulate, but was told that there was no plan to send a volunteer army from America. Pawning his revolver, he walked out of New York City and collapsed from exhaustion. On waking, he walked to [[Fordham College]] where a Catholic priest served him breakfast.<ref name="alland19">Alland, p. 19; Ware, pp. 19–21. Ware says he went not to the consulate but instead found a reception for "a Frenchmen's Society", where he exhausted his hosts' patience and from which he was expelled.</ref>

After a brief period of farm working and odd jobs at [[Mount Vernon, New York]], Riis returned to New York City, where he read in [[The Sun (New York)|The New York ''Sun'']] that the newspaper was recruiting soldiers for the war. Riis rushed there to enlist, but the editor (whom he later realized was [[Charles Anderson Dana]]) claimed or affected ignorance but offered the famished Riis a dollar for breakfast; Riis indignantly refused.<ref name="alland19" /> Riis was destitute, at one time sleeping on a tombstone and surviving on windfall apples. Still, he found work at a brickyard at [[East Brunswick Township, New Jersey|Little Washington]] in New Jersey, and was there for six weeks until he heard that a group of volunteers was going to the war. Thereupon he left for New York.<ref>Ware, pp. 21–23.</ref>

On arrival, Riis found that the rumor was true but that he had arrived too late. He pleaded with the French consul, who expelled him. He made various other attempts to enlist, none successful.<ref>Ware, p. 23.</ref> As autumn began, Riis was destitute, without a job. He survived on scavenged food and handouts from [[Delmonico's Restaurant]], and slept in public areas or in a foul-smelling police lodging-houses. At one point, Riis's only companion was a stray dog. One morning he awoke in a police lodging-house to find that his gold locket (with its strand of Elisabeth's hair) had been stolen. He complained to the sergeant, who became enraged and expelled him. Riis was devastated.<ref>Riis, ''The Making of an American'' (1904 ed.), pp. 72–74.</ref> The story became a favorite of Riis's.<ref>"Vice Which Is Unchecked", New York ''The Express Tribune'' (date unidentified, but the second half of this is reprinted in Alland, pp.&nbsp;32–33); as an anecdote told to Theodore Roosevelt, see Alland, p.&nbsp;32.</ref> One of his personal victories, he later confessed, was not using his eventual fame to ruin the career of the offending officer.<ref>Riis, ''The Making of an American'' (1904 ed.), pp. 231–33.</ref> Disgusted, he left New York, buying a passage on a ferry with the silk handkerchief that was his last possession. By doing odd jobs and stowing away on freight trains, Riis eventually reached [[Philadelphia]], where he appealed to the Danish Consul, Ferdinand Myhlertz, for help and was cared for, for two weeks by the Consul and his wife.<ref>Ware, pp. 25–26.</ref>

Myhlertz sent Riis, now dressed properly in a suit, to the home of an old classmate in [[Jamestown, New York]], in the western part of the state.<ref>Ware, p. 26.</ref> Riis worked as a carpenter throughout the Scandinavian enclave in surrounding communities, as well as performing a variety of other assorted jobs. He achieved sufficient financial stability to find the time to experiment as a writer, in both Danish and English, although his attempt to get a job at a [[Buffalo, New York|Buffalo]], New York newspaper was unsuccessful, and magazines repeatedly rejected his submissions.<ref>Alland, p. 20; Ware, p. 26</ref>

Riis was in much demand as a carpenter, a major reason being the low prices he charged. After a while, Riis returned to New York City.<ref>Ware, pp. 26–27</ref> He was most successful as a salesman, particularly of [[Ironing|flatirons]] and [[Ironing|fluting irons]], becoming promoted to the sales representative of them for the state of [[Illinois]]. In Chicago, he was cheated of both his money and his stock and had to return to an earlier base in [[Pittsburgh]] where he found that the subordinates he had left to sell in [[Pennsylvania]] had cheated him in the same manner. With funds tight, and while bedridden with a fever, Riis learned from a letter that Elisabeth, the former object of his affection, was engaged to a cavalry officer. Once recovered from his illness, Riis returned to New York City, selling flatirons along the way.<ref>Alland, p. 21.</ref>

[[File:Christmas Seal1, 1907.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|The first US [[Christmas seal]], 1907 issue]]
In his earlier years Riis had lost six of his brothers who died of [[tuberculosis]], which was occurring in alarming proportions in Europe and the United States. In 1906 Riis received a letter from a family member in Denmark, with a postage stamp and [[Christmas seal]] affixed to it, informing him of the great success Christmas seals were experiencing in Denmark in raising funds to fight tuberculosis. Given the plight that befell his brothers, Riis became very interested, especially in the efforts of [[Einar Holbøll]] who was responsible for the issuing of Christmas seals, which were being sold at Danish post offices. The sale of Christmas seals had experienced great success in Denmark, and Sweden also. Inspired by the news, Riis was compelled  to write an article in a magazine about the dreaded disease and the success of Christmas seals, entitled "Christmas stamps", urging that such a program be adopted in the United States. Though his idea was supported by a few doctors and hospitals, it was generally shrugged off by the greater population who assumed there was simply no way to deal with the disease. When [[Emily Bissell]], secretary of the Delaware Red Cross, read Riis's article she thought the idea had great promise. After overcoming initial skepticism she persuaded a printer to produce 50,000 Christmas seals on credit. After getting permission from the Delaware Postmaster, they were sold in various post offices in Delaware. The idea quickly took hold. Through the efforts of Jacob Riis and Emily Bissell, along with the Red Cross, the first Christmas seals saw great success in raising funds in the United States in 1907 and thereafter.<ref>{{cite book |last=Ostler |first=Fred J. |title= Father of the Christmas Seal |volume= |authorlink= |publisher=Coronet Printing |location= |year=1947 |isbn= |url=https://www.seal-society.org/sites/default/files/pdf/news/88/holboll%2011-47%20coronet%20article.pdf |page=36 |ref=ostler1947}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Collins |first=Ace |title=Stories behind the great traditions of Christmas |volume= |publisher=Zondervan |location=Grand Rapids, Mich. |year=2003 |isbn=978-0-31024-8804 |page=53 |url=https://archive.org/details/storiesbehindgre0000coll_v7g4/page/50/mode/2up |ref=collins2003}}</ref>