June 15, 1904, screams fill the air over the East River. The screaming of people who are drowning. The “General Slocum,” an excursion boat, is on its way to Long Island. On board are mostly families from New York’s Little Germany. Over one thousand German-Americans die in the river on this early summer’s day. From drowning, burning, or caught up in the boat’s paddle-wheels. The catastrophe marks the end of this Little Germany, a neighborhood in New York’s Lower East Side. br br “Little Germanies” are blooming all over the United States in the second half of the 19th century. Businesses and cultural institutions, schools and churches, newspapers and clubs—everything is there for the powerful and rich German-speaking communities. In New York’s Little Germany, there are more than 70,000 Germans in the second half of the 19th century. Castle Garden and thenEllis Island are the central points of immigration. The newcomers are overwhelmingly working-class people without substantial wealth.