This is Bianca Ottone, Founder of My Italian Family.

It took Hurricane Sandy just a few hours to cause unbelievable damage and destruction to parts of the East Coast but it will take billions of dollars and years to rebuild. Many people lost everything, their cars, their homes, their personal belongings and are still living in temporary housing. Our hearts and prayers go to them.

The Ellis Island Museum was not immune to Sandy's wrath, in fact it has remained closed ever since.

Baggage being moved out after damage Courtesy of National Park Service www.ellisisland.org

I remember back in 1999 when I was starting My Italian Family, I visited the Museum for the first time. It was a glorious day in September, I took the ferry and while passing the Statue of Liberty I tried to imagine what our Italian Ancestors must have felt when they arrived in this great country and saw it for the first time: freedom, opportunity, and yes, a new and better life for them and their children.

Entering the Ellis Island Museum, the gateway from the Old to the New World for millions of immigrants, was a dream come true. I walked through the Great Hall where people were processed; I immersed myself in the exhibits with so many beautiful photographs witnessing the hard journey of our Ancestors. Despite the fact that I have returned to the Museum many more times in the last 13 years, I still cherish that first visit which inspired me to finish what I had just started: My Italian Family and help people of Italian descent to reconnect to their roots back in Italy.

And now a message from Stephen Briganti, President and Chief Executive Officer of The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc.:

In the 23 years that Ellis Island has been open as a museum, nearly 50 million people have passed through its doors, tracing the footsteps of their ancestors and searching for the arrival records of the several million Italians and millions of other people who immigrated to America since 1892.

Then came Hurricane Sandy which ravaged both Liberty and Ellis islands. At Ellis, the basement was badly flooded destroying systems, our servers and our records (we have a backup.)

The infrastructure damage was so serious that it is still not known when the island will open although the goal is Labor Day. We are all working hard on fixing it, but it will take millions of dollars to get the work done.

Baggage display space now empty Courtesy of National Park Service www.ellisisland.org

One of our directors has put up a challenge matching grant of $100,000 which we hope you will consider helping us match. It will be just one way that we are putting together funds to repair the American Family Immigration History Center (The Records Center) which we are responsible for getting back up and running. Meantime, the information is available on our website at www.ellisisland.org.

We appreciate your help as we work to come out from under this terrible situation and re-open Ellis Island so Americans can travel there to search their records.

Thanking you for whatever help you can give us,

Stephen A. Briganti
President and CEO
The Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation, Inc.