The second "wave" of U.S. immigration, from 1870 to 1920, brought more than 26 million men, women, and children onto American shores. June Granatir Alexander's history of the period underscores the diversity of peoples who came to the United States in these years and emphasizes the important shifts in their geographic origins—from northern and western Europe to southern and eastern Europe—that led to the distinction between "old" and "new" immigrants.

Alexander offers an engrossing picture of the immigrants' daily lives, including the settlement patterns of individuals and families, the demographics and characteristics of each of the ethnic groups, and the pressures to "Americanize" that often made the adjustment to life in a new country so difficult. The approach, similar to David Kyvig's highly successful Daily Life in the United States, 1920–1940 (published by Ivan R. Dee in 2004), presents history with an appealing immediacy, on a level that everyone can understand.