The Red Star Line Museum in Antwerp tells the tale of one of history’s greatest migrations.
Walking through Antwerp’s Diamond District
Just out of Antwerp’s magnificently OTT, cathedral-esque Centraal Station, the Diamond District starts. The majority of the world’s sparklers are traded here, but the lack of glitz and bling comes as a surprise. The relative dowdiness of the shopfronts and putative showrooms is an indication of serious business. The people buying and selling here know what they’re doing – and aren’t going to be suckered in by flamboyant decoration.
But to realise why Antwerp is the world’s diamond capital – and subsequently a major fashion hotbed – this isn’t the part of town you come to.
The port of Antwerp
The port has long been this Belgian city’s passport to riches. The location on the River Scheldt, connected to Europe’s major rivers and the North Sea, has made Antwerp a key shipping hub between the continent and the rest of the world.
It’s not just precious stones and clothes that Antwerp has been shipping. At the spruced up southern area of the docklands, now home to museums and a sprinkling of warehouse-style cafés, is the former control station for steerage passengers on the Red Star Line.
Red Star Line Museum review: The stories inside
In September 2013, it reopened as the Red Star Line Museum, and it attempts to tell the tale of the two million people who travelled to North America from this spot between 1873 and 1934. Many would never return – it was one of the greatest mass migrations in human history. Some were chasing a dream. Others were fleeing poverty. All were taking a huge gamble.
Some did better than others, though. In 1893, five-year-old Israel Isidore Baline from Belarus left with his family on a Red Star Line Ship. Later, his music enchanted the world and he took the name Irving Berlin.
Photographs in the Red Star Line Museum
The photographs inside the museum are enormously atmospheric. People in little more than rags mill around with those in their only suit, and cloth sacks full of possessions are draped over shoulders.
The sense of nervousness and fear is palpable. Intrusive medical examinations could be the end of the dream for some – they may have spent all they had to get across Europe, but if the doctor said no, they were left stranded.
The journey to Antwerp
For many, getting to Antwerp was a bigger journey than getting across the Atlantic. Red tape was battled, documents were collected and long, uncomfortable train journeys were braved in unheated carriages.
The story of an eleven-year-old girl from what is now the Czech Republic is typical. In 1901, her father feared war was coming. He was the mayor of the village, and sold everything the family owned to pay for tickets to the US. They ended up in Tacoma, Washington, purely because two other family members already lived there.
This is one myth that is cleared up somewhat. The idea that the migrants didn’t really know what they were getting into is often false – many were acting on letters and advice from people who had already made the leap.
Antwerp then and now
But Antwerp was the springboard for that leap, and the museum gives a sense of what a remarkable place it must have been at the time. Fleeting, temporary residents from all over Europe would be crammed into often squalid boarding houses. Conmen and thieves preyed on tickets and possessions. The city crackled with nervous energy.
And it still does today. People representing more than 170 nationalities live in Antwerp, and there’s a sense of urban cool edge that sends weekend breakers flocking in from the Netherlands and Germany. Almost all of them arrive at the vast marble-clad palace that is Antwerpen Centraal station, however. The starry-eyed wonder of the arrivals from a century ago is repeated on a daily basis.
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