Language teaching textbooks offer us a window into the culture and language of the period in which they were written. The texts used as language input, the language repertoires taught and the teaching approach taken all have the potential to convey existing societal attitudes and values. This is particularly true for English teaching materials produced in the early 1900s in the USA, known as the Americanisation era, a period when large numbers of non-English speaking immigrants, mainly from southern and eastern Europe, arrived in America (Cavanaugh 1996; Roberts 1920). The large number of teaching manuals produced in this era aimed to educate immigrants in English language, the U.S. Constitution and, more broadly, how to fit into American culture. These manuals represent a cohesive genre, not only in their aim but also their methods; they use English exclusively, focus on speech over writing, and present contextualised language in model conversations and narratives, making them an accessible genre for analysis. This study examines a selection of ten such language teaching manuals from this period, exploring attitudes to the newcomers conveyed through input language, texts and teaching instructions. Input on American culture ranges from benign topics such as ‘The Post Office’ and ‘Public Signs’, to more didactic chapters on ‘The Care of the Teeth’ and ‘Politeness at the Dinner Table’, while many of the stories and dialogues communicate a dismissive attitude to alternative cultures, with the overriding theme that conforming to American conventions will make the newcomers intrinsically better people.