What does President Donna E. Shalala have in common with comedy impresario Mel Brooks, suspense writer Mary Higgins Clark, and the Forbes family of business publishing fame? All were honored in April with Ellis Island Family Heritage Awards for their contributions to the American experience.

The Statue of Liberty Ellis Island Foundation presents the awards each year to a select number of Port of New York and Ellis Island immigrants or their descendants. Recipients receive a framed copy of the original ship’s passenger manifest documenting the arrival of their family in America, obtained from the database of the American Family Immigration History Center at the Ellis Island Immigration Museum.

President Shalala’s paternal grandfather, who arrived from Lebanon in 1900, is among 25 million people on the database who entered the United States through the Port of New York and Ellis Island between 1892 and 1924. Forty percent of Americans have family immigration records in this database.