History
Hungarians have been a part of America for as long as Europeans have settled the New World, with Hungarian Americans such as Michael de Kovats, the founder of the United States Cavalry, active in the American Revolution. Hungarians have maintained a constant state of immigration to the United States since then, however are best known for three principle waves of immigration.The first wave occurred in 1849-1850 by the so-called "Forty-niners," who emigrated to escape retribution by Austrian authorities after the defeat of the Hungarian Revolution of 1848. By the turn of the century, the United States saw an immigration boom primarily of Southern and Eastern Europeans. Included in this wave was between 650,000-700,000 ethnic Hungarians. Unlike the educated gentry who formed the core of the 1849 wave, the second wave was mostly poor and uneducated immigrants seeking a better life in America.
The circumstances of the third wave of immigration had much in common with the first wave. In 1956, Hungary was again under the power of a foreign state, this time the Soviet Union, and again Hungarians rose up in revolution. Like the revolution of 1848, the 1956 Hungarian Revolution failed and led to the emigration of 200,000 "56-ers" fleeing persecution after the revolution. 40,000 of them found their way to the United States.
Demographics
According to the 2006 US Census, there are 1,563,081 Hungarians in the United States as of 2006. Estimates of the number of Hungarians in the United States go well above 2 million. This number also includes the large number of ethnic Hungarian immigrants who have arrived to the US from Romania, Czechoslovakia, the former Yugoslavia.
The states with the largest Hungarian American populations include:
| Ohio | 193,951 | New York | 137,029 | California | 133,988 | Pennsylvania | 132,184 | New Jersey | 115,615 | Michigan | 98,036 | Florida | 96,885 |
The highest percentage of Hungarians in any American town, village or other, is in Kiryas Joel, New York (The great majority of its residents are Hasidic Jews belonging to the Satmar Hasidic dynasty, originated from Hungary) where 18.9% of the total population claimed Hungarian as first ancesty. Other places with over 10% are Fairport Harbor, Ohio (14.1%) and West Pike Run Township, Pennsylvania (11,7%). About a hundred other places have +5% of Hungarians, but the highest number of Hungarians living in the same place is in New York City.
Notables
See also
References
External links
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Last updated on Thursday July 24, 2008 at 03:24:37 PDT (GMT -0700)
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