Mary Antin Quotes

I decided that, somehow, I had to get out of there and go to Hollywood. I had never been to America.

America was born in outrageous ambition, so bold as to be improbable. The deprived, the oppressed, the powerless from all over the globe came here with little more than the desire to realize themselves.

I will keep all our young people from having to abandon their towns and families for the other side of the border

If you were brought up in the '40s, a kid in Ossining, New York, hanging out at the poolroom and stealing, how can you think, 'Here I am in Ossining. I, too, can be a movie star!'

When I came to America, I dreamed bigger dreams.

If there is something that needs to be done on my behalf back home, for example, my brothers take care of it for me. I share everything with my family; all my happiness and success is theirs.

If you really look at it, I have done the 'American Dream' that people have died on boats to come here to live.

When you come from where I come from, if anyone in the family makes it out, the others kind of come with you.

I hoped for something else. It's a simple dream, but it speaks to us so powerfully because it is our dream - one that exists at the very center of the American experience. One that says if you're willing to work hard and take responsibility, then you'll have the chance to reach for something else; for something better.

Growing up, I knew you were supposed to have a profession - and something better than being a shopkeeper, which is what my parents were.

Success is not a destination, but the road that you're on. Being successful means that you're working hard and walking your walk every day. You can only live your dream by working hard towards it. That's living your dream.

The whole of society is like a cabbage-stalk covered with caterpillars, and none is satisfied till it has crawled to the top.

Walls have never stopped people from trying to better their lives.

It takes three-quarters of the world in these days to hold the Irish family, and is pleasant to know that some of the elder sons of the family are considered by their discriminating fellow citizens worthy to be entrusted with the liberties and fortunes of their adopted countries.

The family is the most important unit of society…. When all is said and done, there is nothing more important than the family.

If we wish to say that no man shall come here who can not read and write, let us say so; but let us not say that no man shall come here who has a wife who can not read and write, unless he leave her behind…We want members of families. We do not believe that it is better to admit a man, no matter how well educated, to be separated from his family and to live here by himself. It is better neither for the country nor for him.

A familiar question for Australians is how much we are a product of our circumstances, and how much we are what we have made ourselves to be. In truth, by the act of migration the country was made: by that voluntary act and by the emigrants' ambitions it was built.

People want to feel aspirational; they want to feel that they can move to the next socioeconomic class.

Go to the United States and see what they are doing with the American Dream..

The American Dream

My parents both came to the United States from the Dominican Republic, and they were deeply grateful for the opportunities this country provided. They raised my siblings and me to want to make a difference and give back. They taught us to work hard and aim high, but to also make sure the ladder was down to help others climb up.

The old joke in my family is that the last person who isn't from New York was coming from Russia.

I came to America because this is a country defined by ladders of opportunity.

I say to people that Los Angeles is a city of America's hope and its promise. It's a city where we come from every corner of the Earth here to make the American dream happen.

With every generation comes a new wave of hopefuls: small-town escapees, European refugees, disaffected Londoners.