As the U.S. Government aggressively pursued settling of the West beginning with Congressional action to pass the landmark Homestead and Railroad Acts of 1862, recruiting of immigrants from Europe and elsewhere to come to the U.S. became a significant business. Brochures were distributed and agents dispatched. To speed building of the trancontinental railways, the railroads recruited Chinese laborers to come to the U.S. - hard workers willing to do work that others would not. Xenophobia and bigotry eventually halted this source of immigrant labor in the 1930s but the contribution made by Chinese immigrants during the late 1800's and early 1900's should not be understated.
The timber industry also relied heavily on immigrant labor in the woods and mills - typically doing the least desirable and most dangerous of jobs. The following photo taken in 1929 tells the story. This shows a No Smoking sign posted at the Long Bell Lumber Company mill in Longview (later owned by Weyerhaeuser Co.)
Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress, AEP-WAS24, Charles Chamberlane photographer, circa 1929
Immigrants from all over the world built the Pacific Northwest and continue to provide the back-breaking labor required by our state's ag industry even today. Same need as history - different languages.