Gateway State, Not Gateway City: New Immigrants in the Hudson Valley

Jacqueline Villarrubia, University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY)
Nancy A. Denton, University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY)

Much research on new immigrants outside the gateway states has been on new destinations in the Midwest and South, not on new destinations within the gateway states, but outside the gateway metropolitan areas within them. In this paper we examine Spanish-speaking immigrants to two small cities that have not received many immigrants since the early decades of the twentieth century, Newburgh and Poughkeepsie, in the Hudson Valley of New York State. Data come primarily from in-depth interviews with 50 Latin American immigrants (25 in each city), supplemented with data from Census 2000 and the 2005 ACS. New immigrants tend to come directly from their home country, know only a few relatives or friends upon arrival, and have been here a short time. They settle in poor neighborhoods close to African Americans, with whom relations are not always cordial, and in both cities, are actively forming organizations to help them adapt.