Most scientists believe that human beings first came to America over the Bering Straits about 20,000 years ago. These were the ancestors of the many Native American cultures, which would people the landscape for thousands of years. Around the year 1000, a small number of Vikings would arrive. Five-hundred years later, the great European migration would begin. Crossing the Atlantic meant two to three months of seasickness, overcrowding, limited food rations, and disease, but the lure of available land and the hope for political and religious freedoms kept the Europeans coming. People from Europe and all around the World are still coming today in order to seek out the “Land of the Free.”

The United States of America has embraced and welcomed immigration since its beginning including Herbert H. Dow, developer of Dow Chemical Co., who was born in Ontario, Canada.

Dow moved with his family to Cleveland, Ohio, and graduated with a B.S. from Case Western Reserve University in 1888. His senior thesis, which he presented that summer at the Cleveland meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, dealt with brine waters in Ohio.

From 1888-89, when Dow was professor of chemistry at the Huron St. Hospital College, he developed a process for manufacturing bromine from brine, receiving a patent in April of 1892.

In 1889 he organized a company to work with brine water in fields near Canton. That venture failed, however in 1890, he started Dow Process Co. in Midland, Mich. where the brine water contained heavy concentrations of bromine. Dow organized Midland Chemical Co., and in 1895 began manufacturing chlorine and its derivatives. He formed Dow Chemical Co. in 1897 to manufacture chlorine and caustic soda.

In 1900, Dow Chemical absorbed Midland Chemical Co. Dow was president and general manager of Dow Chemical, responsible for developing new chemical processes for which more than 100 patents were granted. His home in Midland, known as the Herbert H. Dow House, was declared a U.S. National Historic Landmark in 1976.

Between 1880 and 1930 over 27 million people entered the United States, but after the outbreak of World War I in 1914, American attitudes toward immigration began to shift. Nationalism and suspicion of foreigners were on the rise, and immigrants’ loyalties were often called into question. Through the early 1920s, a series of laws was passed to limit the flow of immigrants. Today, millions of immigrants throughout the years have had their influence on America. Herbert Dow has had a lasting influence in not only Cleveland, but he has had a lasting influence on all of America.

Today’s immigration laws, like in the 1920s, are still designed to limit the flow of immigrants into the United States. They are much more complicated than they were in those early days of America, but there are still many ways a foreigner can immigrate to the United States, become a permanent resident, or become a citizen.

Maybe you have had or know someone who has had a difficult time understanding our immigration laws. If so, you or they need legal counsel. Even if you already live here and just want to become a permanent resident or citizen, or have a relative that wants to become a permanent resident or citizen of the United States, contact us right now at www.immigrationlawstation.com, and we will help you find an immigration lawyer in your area who will answer any legal questions you may have about immigration law.

Who knows, maybe you, your relative, or someone you know that wants to be a legal resident in the United States will be the next Herbert H. Dow.