During the first decade of the nineteenth century American ships brought a variety of goods to Malta, including flour, rice, pepper, salted meat, rum, tobacco, and mahogany wood from Boston and Baltimore, as well as dried fruits, cotton, wax, pearls, goat hides, coffee, potatoes, drugs, and sponges from Smyrne and the Greek archipelago. Trade would rise and fall cyclically. Malta's biggest boon of American shipping was during the Crimean War, between 1854 and 1856, when Great Britain and France were fighting Russia. Malta also emerged as a stepping stone in the wool trade between Barbary and the United States because it received wool from different ports in North Africa for shipment to the United States. Later, American tobacco was shipped to Barbary and Sicily through Malta....Malta also imported petroleum, rum, pepper, flour, log-wood, pitch, resin, turpentine, coffee, sugar, cloves, codfish, wheat, cheese, butter, and lard. Meanwhile, the island nation exported to the United States goods such as olive oil, lemons, sulfur, ivory, salt, rags, goat skins, stoneware, soap, sponges, and donkeys.
The damaged American oil tanker SSOhio arriving in Malta, 15 August 1942
During World War II, some American ships took part in Operation Pedestal, a British convoy meant to supply Malta with critical supplies in August 1942. Most notably, the American tanker SSOhio supplied crucial fuel and food to the islands. Later on in 1942, the aircraft carrier USS Wasp twice delivered Spitfires to Malta.[2]
General Dwight D. Eisenhower and Italian Prime Minister Pietro Badoglio signed an armistice in September 1943 on board HMS Nelson while anchored in Malta's Grand Harbour. Later on in 1943, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt visited Malta described the island as "one tiny bright flame in the darkness – a beacon of hope for the clearer days which have come."[2]
Malta and the United States established full diplomatic relations upon Malta's independence in 1964; overall relations are positive. The United States has been sympathetic to Malta's campaign to attract private investment, and some firms operating in Malta have U.S. ownership or investment. These include major hotels, manufacturing and repair facilities, and some offices servicing local and regional operations.[citation needed]
In 2005, the Maltese Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi met U.S. President George W. Bush at the White House. Malta acted as an evacuation point for US and other citizens during the Libyan Civil War in 2011. That year, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton briefly visited Malta while returning from Libya. Prime Minister Joseph Muscat met President Barack Obama a number of times.[2]
On 10 August 2019, the governments of both Malta and the United States issued a joint statement emphasizing the countries' "friendship and close collaboration".[4]
The United States established its embassy in Malta in 1964. It was originally located in the capital Valletta, but it eventually moved to Sliema. It moved to Floriana in 1974, and again to a new building in Ta' Qali National Park in Attard in 2011.[2]
Andreassi, Diane. "Maltese Americans." Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America, edited by Thomas Riggs, (3rd ed., vol. 3, Gale, 2014), pp. 163–170. online
Andreassi, Diane. Maltese in Detroit (Arcadia, 2011).
Cassar, Paul. Early Relations between Malta and the United States of America (Valletta, Malta: Midsea Books, 1976).
Lubig, Joseph M. Maltese in Michigan (Michigan State University Press, 2011).