Armenians have settled in North America since the first decades of the 17th century. The name of the first Armenian who came here, the Persian subject soldier John Martin (Hovhannes Martikian), who was engaged in tobacco growing, is mentioned from 1618. The next mention of Armenians arriving in America relates to two Istanbul Armenians silkworms, who in 1653-1654, at the invitation of the governor of Virginia, came to this country from the Ottoman Empire to develop silk production here.
In the 17th and 18th centuries, Armenians in small groups emigrated to America from Europe (Poland, Hungary, and the Netherlands) and India and settled in the states of Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, and Massachusetts.
In the 1930s a new flow of Armenians to the U.S. was caused by the propaganda and educational activities of American missionaries in Western Armenia, Cilicia, and other Armenian-populated areas of Turkey. The first Armenian intellectual in the New World was Khachatur Voskanyan (Kristapor Oskan), who in 1834, at the age of 16, being a pupil of Constantinople missionary school, headed the flow of the Armenian youth, mostly from Constantinople, to the higher and advanced educational institutions of the United States.
The first few Armenians educated in the new country participated in the Civil War for the Unification of the United States (1861-1865), among them 30 Armenian volunteer doctors fighting in the Northern Army.
In the late 1870s, the first Armenian associations were formed in New York, Worcester, and Providence. While in the early 1880s there were about 500 Armenians in the U.S., in the late 1880s there were about 1,500 Armenians. During this period the Armenian revolutionary parties (Hnchakyan and Dashnaktsakan) were free to operate in the U.S.
Since 1980s of the 19th century a flow of Armenians from the Ottoman Empire to the USA has increased. 95% of the emigrants were young people, most of whom settled in the new country and never returned to their homeland, which contributed to the formation of new Armenians.
Because of the violence and mass murders of Armenians committed by the Ottoman Empire, the flow of Armenians to the U.S. increased even more in the 90s of the 19th century. Especially massive was the flow of Armenians from Kharberd (which amounted to about 40% of all Armenian emigration).
In 1891-1895 5,500 Armenians emigrated from the Ottoman Empire to the USA. According to the statistics of the Immigration Commission of the United States the number of emigrants from “Asiatic Turkey” before 1894 was sharply reduced, while in 1895-1898 it increased sharply, reaching around 15,913 people. Obviously, more than 10,000 of the refugees who left the region at that time were Armenians who had survived the Hamid massacre. Already by 1900 the number of Armenians in the U.S. reached 15-20 thousand, according to some sources even 25 thousand.
Armenians from Russian Empire were also settled in the U.S. due to economic and political factors. According to the data of the US Immigration Commission in 1899-1924 over 3500 Armenians moved from Russia to the USA.
Before World War I there were about 60,000 Armenians in the United States. During the war the ban on migration, which was abolished by the Young Turks Constitution, was reinstated and as a result only a small number of Armenians were able to emigrate. If in 1914 7785 Armenians emigrated to the USA, then in the following years their number sharply decreased and in 1915-1919 it was only 3620.
The rise of the Kemalist movement in the Ottoman Turkey, accompanied with periodic mass killings and deportations of Armenians and the fall of the First Armenian Republic (1918-1920) stimulated Armenians again to migrate to the USA. In 1921 their number reached the highest level compared to previous years – 10,212 people, most of whom were recruited from Turkish harems, non-Christian families, camps and orphanages by Armenian and American charitable organizations and American preachers.
After World War I, as a result of regular revisions of American immigration laws, immigration of Armenians was severely restricted. In 1924 the National Origins Quota Act was adopted. According to different information the total number of the Armenians living in the USA that year was 120-125 thousand.
In the 1920s-1930s, Armenians from Cilicia, Greece, the Middle East, and other places who had survived the massacres migrated to the United States and settled there. Armenians were mostly concentrated in Massachusetts, California, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. The most Armenian-populated cities were Detroit, Los Angeles, Providence, Boston, Worcester, Fresno, San Francisco, etc.
Over the decades, Armenians spread across the country, settling in almost every state in the United States.
On the eve of World War II, there were about 200,000 Armenians living in the United States. During the war, 18,500 to 20,000 Armenians served with American soldiers. Many of them were awarded the highest ranks of the U.S. Army (the first Armenian general in the U.S. Army, Hayk Shekerjian, commander Jack (Sirak) Khanikian, colonels Sargis Zardarian and Kirk Buchakh) and were decorated with the highest orders. Hero of America of Armenian descent, Senior Lieutenant Ernest Dervishian was awarded the exclusive and highest honor in the United States, the Congressional Medal of Honor.
A new wave of Armenian migration to the United States began after World War II. After the approval of the Law on the Displaced Persons by the U.S. Congress in 1948, the Armenian National Committee for the Relief of the Displaced Persons of Homeland (ANCHA, chaired by George Martikian) until 1952 relocated 4,500 deported Armenians from Germany, Austria and Italy during the World War II to the USA.
In 1947 the number of Armenians in the U.S. made 215 thousand. In the post-war years the Armenians emigrated to the USA mainly from Europe.
The flow of Armenians in the U.S. got a new impulse in 1950s, when due to unstable economic and political processes they started to arrive here from Egypt (1952), Syria (1958-1961), Soviet Armenia (1960), Turkey and Greece (since mid-1960s), Lebanon (since late 1960s), Iran (1979), Jordan and Iraq.
In 1965 the number of Armenians in the USA reached 300 thousand. In 1965, the immigration act adopted in the USA canceled the restrictions for immigration, and stimulated annual immigration of about 2 thousand Armenians from different parts of the world (especially from the Near and Middle East and the Soviet Armenia).
In 1970-1972 about 450-500 thousand Armenians lived in the USA.
From 1960 to 1970, 18 500 Armenians immigrated from the Near and Middle East and Armenia to the USA through ANCHA. In 1979 alone 3,200 people moved from Soviet Armenia to Los Angeles.
In 1985 between 600,000 and 800,000 Armenians were living in the United States.
The Spitak earthquake, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the social, economic and political instability of newly independent Armenia contributed to a new flow of Armenians to the United States in 1988.
Armenians in the U.S. actively participate in the public and political life of the country. American scientists and artists of Armenian descent have contributed to the development of American science and culture.
The first place of worship for the Armenian-Americans was the Armenian Evangelical People’s Church of Martirosyats, which was founded in 1881 in Worcester by the initiative of the graduate of the Harberd Bible School Hovhannes Yazijian.
In 1891 Hovsep Vardapet, the first Armenian Apostolic Church in the United States was built and consecrated in Worcester, on the initiative of the first Armenian-American pastor.
The Diocese of the Armenian Church of America was founded in 1898. (legalized in 1902) by the patriarchal decree of the Catholicos of All Armenians Mkrtich I. Vanetsi.
There are currently functioning Eastern and Western Dioceses of the Armenian Apostolic Church in the U.S., which were founded in 1927 with the patriarchal decree of Catholicos of All Armenians Gevorg V. Surenyants.
The Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia also has Eastern (founded in 1957) and Western (founded in 1972) Eparchies. There are also the Diocese of the Armenian Catholic Church of North America and Canada, the Armenian Evangelical Association of America (founded in 1918 in New Jersey) and the Union of the Armenian Evangelical Churches of North America (founded in 1971). Under the aegis of the Dioceses, educational institutions, women’s unions, and youth organizations operate.
The first Armenian school in the United States, the Vardukian Gymnasium, was founded in the late 1880s in New York City. The first daily school, the National Secondary Grammar School of the Holy Martyrs of Ferre, has been in operation in Los Angeles since 1964. Currently there are over 170 educational institutions in the U.S., over 30 media outlets, about 30 Armenian studies centers, departments, courses, numerous cultural centers, NGOs, unions, Armenian radio and television stations and TV stations. There are Armenian book houses and publishing houses, bookstores, Armenian squares, parks, monuments, cross-stones, “Hayastan”, “Armenia”, “Artsakh” as well as streets and highways named after famous Armenians. The Armenian Heritage Park is located in Boston.
In 2003, the number of Armenians in the United States was around 1.2 million, and now there are about 1,600,000 Armenians (mainly in Los Angeles, New York, Detroit, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Fresno, San Francisco, and Providence).
The Armenian community in the United States is the second largest. The flow of Armenians to the United States continues to this day – mostly from European countries, especially from the Middle East.