Immigrants are transforming small towns and suburbs across the country. A new radio documentary, available online here, took a look at the impact in a few of these places. From “Pueblo USA”:

Is there a new American Revolution in the making? Thirty-five million foreigners have come to live here. It won’t be long before the nation’s foreign-born population will surpass the historic 14.7 percent share reached in 1910, when Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty famously beckoned to Europe’s “huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

As News 21 has found, the immigration issue in small towns is complicated. American Radio Works looked at Siler City, N.C., which

used to be the kind of town where almost everyone, black and white, had roots going back a century or two. Characters on the Andy Griffith Show mentioned Siler City, and the actor who played Aunt Bee retired there because it reminded her of Mayberry. In short, it was just about the last place a Spanish-speaking immigrant was likely to land. That started to change in the 1990s. Today, thanks to chicken processing jobs that no one else wants, Siler City is about half Latino.

The documentary also takes a look at marriage visas (more difficult to get that you might think), the struggle of surviving in the U.S., and the backlash against immigrants.