Riding the Rails presents the poignant and little-known story of teen hobos during the 1930s, a time of desperation and bitter hardship These young itinerant Americans were all searching for a better life; what they found was a mixture of freedom, camaraderie, misery, and loneliness
When did riding the rails start?
Riding the Rails 1929-1941
When did hobos ride rails?
During the 1920s people who rode the rails were either seasonal workers or permanent transients called hoboes (or tramps or bums) The hoboes were not in search of jobs; instead they sought a detachment from mainstream American society They were content to live a life of aimless wandering
Why did men ride the rails in the 1930s?
Canada was in the throes of the Great Depression and by the fall of 1932, more than 400,000 people — almost one in four Canadians — didn’t have a job Many men took to riding the rails, criss-crossing the country in a fruitless and frustrating search for work and food
How long did riding the rails last?
The railroad, which stretched nearly 2,000 miles between Iowa, Nebraska and California, reduced travel time across the West from about six months by wagon or 25 days by stagecoach to just four days
Why did 250000 teen hobos ride the rails?
Some left to escape poverty or troubled families, others because it seemed a great adventure At the height of the Great Depression, more than 250,000 teenagers were living on the road in America Many criss-crossed the country by hopping freight trains, although it was both dangerous and illegal
How did hobos ride the rails?
Called “bo chasers” and “car-seal hawks,” they adopted extremely aggressive tactics They took it as their job to terrorize those who rode the rails, often by any means necessary In addition to bouncing out hobos on trains, they often threw stones at hobos or shot them
What is a female hobo called?
bo-ette – a female hobo
How did they bend railroad rails?
The rails are made of a type of steel that while very strong, are also quite pliable, and can be bent around curves simply spiking the rail to the ties at the starting point of the curve, and then pushing on it with long bars used as leverage in the old days, and track machinery in modern times, or even an off track
Is the word hobo offensive?
Be careful when you call a vagrant or homeless person a hobo — although this is exactly what the word means, it is a somewhat offensive term
How many hobos were there in the 1930s?
More than two million men and perhaps 8,000 women became hoboes
What were hobos in the 1930s?
During the Great Depression, millions of unemployed men became “hobos,” homeless vagrants who wandered in search of work Once-proud men, the hobos rode the rails or hitchhiked their way across America, in search of jobs and a better life
Why did John Fawcett leave home at the age of 16?
JOHN FAWCETT(Left West Virginia home in 1936, at age 16): My dad was a doctor so in the Great Depression years I didn’t even hardly know there was such a thing because we never had it hard So, I certainly didn’t run away from home because of home life I just ran away from home – why do boys run away from home?
Why did hobos leave signs?
Hobos signs and symbols were a unique means of communication that helped steer hobos in the right direction—towards work and away from trouble The life of the American hobo was an unpredictable and dangerous one Many hobos desired to protect their community from cruelty and steer them in the direction of goodwill
Who was the most famous hobo?
1 is arguably the most famous hobo in the United States His given name is Leon Ray Livingston and he was born in 1872 and he was a lifelong wanderer He was riding the rails, and stowing away on ships starting at the age of 11 and then he began to write about his journeys He wrote about a dozen books on the subject
How long did the Great Depression last?
43
Is the Great Depression an era?
The Great Depression was the worst economic downturn in the history of the industrialized world, lasting from 1929 to 1939 It began after the stock market crash of October 1929, which sent Wall Street into a panic and wiped out millions of investors
How many men ride the rails looking for work?
An estimated 250,000 men and women — many of them in their teens — turned to the trains as fast and free transportation Some left out of desperation and went looking for work, sometimes traveling hundreds of miles on the rumor of a job waiting farther down the line
Why did Jim leave home?
Clarence Lee, left Louisiana home in 1929 at age 16: On the road I got homesick, a lot of nights layin’ in the dark, total darkness, in a big empty house or barn I got homesick Some of it hurts now Jim Mitchell, left Wisconsin home in 1933 at age 16: You had to do something with your life
Do we still have hobos?
Hobo culture is alive and well in the United States, but it’s a far cry from the sanitized Halloween-costume version most of us are used to — the patched overalls, the charcoal beard and the red-bandana bindle (that’s a bundle on a stick)
Is The Hobo Code real?
These symbols, really hieroglyphs, appeared on posts and bridge abutments, on fences and outbuildings Hobos scrawled the secret language with whatever writing implements were available—a lump of coal, chalk, a nail, or even a sharp-edged rock It was a survival code
How did hobo shoestring lose his fingers?
Riding on trains is a dangerous lifestyle, Nichols admits He was hurt one time while traveling on the Kansas City Southern Railroad in Pittsburg, Kansas He fell and had a pinky and ring finger on top of the rail The train ran over his fingers