New citizens sworn in at Pearson Air Museum

The Fourth of July will have special meaning for some people who gathered Friday at Pearson Air Museum: It will be the first time they can celebrate the holiday as American citizens.

“Now that will be so much more meaningful,” said Heylen Medina, a Vancouver resident who was born in Cuba.

“I’m a citizen now, and I know a lot more about Independence Day — what happened and why,” said Dean Porter, a Canadian-born Vancouver resident.

“Great timing: It puts a different spin” on the holiday, said Petra Maria Sullivan of Vancouver, a German native.

They were among 29 people from 15 nations who took the oath of allegiance Friday. The noon ceremony was part of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ annual Independence Day celebration, which features naturalization events across the country, spokeswoman Sharon Rummery said.

They were sworn in by Anya Ronshaugen, acting director of the Portland Field Office. In taking the oath, they declared their intentions to — among other things — “renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty …” to “defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America” and to “bear arms on behalf of the United States when required …”

For Medina, 25, the path to citizenship meant leaving her mother behind in Cuba to join her father in Vancouver. Lazaro Medina said he left Cuba on a raft in 1994 and — after a circuitous route — settled in Oregon in 1996.

His daughter left Cuba seven years ago, when she was 18. Heylen Medina said she was inspired by “the opportunity to be who you want to be, without people telling you what you have to do.”

The new citizens came here from Mexico (7), Russia (4), Ukraine (3), Germany (2), the Philippines (2), Taiwan (2), and one each from Australia, Canada, China, Cuba, Finland, Guatemala, Pakistan, Peru and South Korea.

Keynote speaker Doug Wilson described the long tradition of immigration to this area and its multicultural history. It started with native people who came here from all over the region for thousands of years. They were followed by the Hudson’s Bay Company’s fur-trading operation that had an even more diverse work force.

“Like you, the people of Fort Vancouver were truly international,” Wilson, a National Park Service archaeologist, said. He quoted George Simpson, Hudson’s Bay governor in the 1820s, who described the soundtrack at Fort Vancouver as “the nicest confusion of tongues since the Tower of Babel.”

Despite the different eras, that population had something in common with Friday’s gathering in Pearson’s historic hangar, Wilson said. They did not share histories, Wilson said, “But they shared dreams for the future.”