The Dilemmas of Diversity

Sometime in the 1970s—the decade during which we celebrated the bicentennial of the United States—a significant part of the American saga seemed to come full circle. An attempt was made by a dozen Mohawks to establish a beachhead on Ellis Island, the place where thousands upon thousands of European immigrants had first touched American shores. The motorboat failed, and the plot to take over the island on the East Coast, as others had seized the island of Alcatraz in San Francisco Bay, was foiled.