in 1950s or earlier, did Amtrak practice racial segregation on its tra

[TimSpencer]

in 1950s or earlier, did Amtrak practice racial segregation on its trains?

(or whatever the US railroads were called back then)

I'm helping my little nephew with a civics class project on racial issue around the world.

(more like doing the project for him) All we found so far is that it was practised on local buses,

but not on commercial airlines in that era.... but found no info about trains yet...

any info appreciated!

 

[had8ley]

in 1950s or earlier, did Amtrak practice racial segregation on its trains?(or whatever the US railroads were called back then)

I'm helping my little nephew with a civics class project on racial issue around the world.

(more like doing the project for him) All we found so far is that it was practised on local buses,

but not on commercial airlines in that era.... but found no info about trains yet...

any info appreciated!

Amtrak did not come into being until the early '70's. By then integration had pretty well settled down after the riots of the '60's. The railroad I worked for (The Texas & Pacific) had separate and apart passenger waiting rooms for both white and "colored"~ that's what the signs said on the outside of the depot. The last pax train we ran had one coach for whites and one for blacks and it came off in 1970. Our first black engineer was not hired until 1973. In the Pullman sleeping car days George M. Pullman forbid his "porters" to wear name badges so it was common, although very degrading, to call every porter "George" for lack of a name tag. It is not acceptable to call today's sleeping car attendants "porters." Good luck with the project uncle!

 

[MrFSS]

in 1950s or earlier, did Amtrak practice racial segregation on its trains?(or whatever the US railroads were called back then)

I'm helping my little nephew with a civics class project on racial issue around the world.

(more like doing the project for him) All we found so far is that it was practiced on local buses,

but not on commercial airlines in that era.... but found no info about trains yet...

any info appreciated!

Amtrak started in 1971. All passenger service before then was run by the individual railroads, of which there were a lot more than there are today. Mergers and takeovers have greatly narrowed the field to a few major freight lines in the US.

But to your original question. I very well remember in the 1940's when we took the train many times between Chicago and Louisville, KY. As the train neared the Ohio river before crossing into "the South" the conductors came through the cars and made all the black folks move to the last car on the train.

In Louisville Union Station there were four restrooms, Mens and Womens for white and "colored". Two restaurants, too for the same reason.

I guess that is discrimination as it was in the south in those days. As I was only about 8-9 years old, then, it didn't make any sense to me, but that's the way it was.

On city buses, white people sat up front - all others in the rear. Again, that was in Louisville.

 

[Steve4031]

Amtrak did not exist until 1970. So it did not practice racial segregation. Some of the railroads in the south did practice segregation in the 1950's. I recall seeing a picture in trains or passenger train journal of a coach car on a train that had a section marked for "coloreds". I think some of the station had segregated waiting rooms. I think the supreme court case "Plessy vs. Ferguson" addressed segregation. This was a case from earlier than the 1950's that determined "separate but equal" was legal. This case actually addressed a situation on the railroad. I'm sure if you google this case you will get more information. You could also google segregation and railroads and see what you get.

 

[Rail Freak]

I believe it was Classic Trains Magazine where I saw an article on Porters and the Civil Rights movement!!!

That was an article on the Pullman Cars!

 

[George Harris]

Before 1971 each railroad company operated their own passenger trains. There were not that many that operated between states with legal segregation and those that did not have legal segregation. In many locales that did not have legal segregation and a very small or no black population, black people frequently found a different problem: There was nothing available to them at all.

"White" and "Colored" coaches, waiting rooms, restaurants, etc. in railroad facilities ended legaly in the early 1950's. I think 1954, maybe earlier. At the time the signs saying "White" and "Colored" were painted out on the waiting room doors, even on small town stations that no longer had passenger train service or had no thrain through when the station was open. However, the practice of continuing to use the waiting room that had been designated for your race continued for several years thereafter. At the time in question, except for a very few routes, passenger train usage was dropping so fast it almost did not matter.

The early 1900 era supreme court decision mentioned, I do not recall its name, required the faciilities to be "seperate but equal" Several of the railroad companies made serious attempts to be sure that happend, others did just enough to stay out of trouble.

 

[profwebs]

Just wanted to ad the the CHS - Charleston, SC station has the separate waiting rooms.

 

[Guest]

In the Pullman sleeping car days George M. Pullman forbid his "porters" to wear name badges so it was common, although very degrading, to call every porter "George" for lack of a name tag.

I guess for the same reason one should not refer to doormen as "Carlton".

However, such discrimination isn't really over. Just how many times I have seen lately, a comment that we will soon have a house for "colored" too, at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, Washington DC.

But I am just Josh'ing ya.

 

[jphjaxfl]

I remember divided coaches on the L&N and other railroads back in th 1950s. One end of the coach was for white passengers and the other end for African American passengers. There was a door in the center of the car dividing those sections. When segregation was finally abolished, the doors were removed, but you could still see where the parititions were in the center of the coach. Some of those L&N coaches were purchased by Amtrak and ran through the late 70s and you could still see the reminants of the partition. The Missouri Pacific Union Station in Little Rock had two long overhead concourses that extended out over the tracks with steps at each track. One concourse was for white passengers and one was for black passengers. By the early 1960s, the concourse that was for black passengers was closed all together. I traveled by train in the south quite a bit as a child and teenager. I enjoyed traveling with African American families who had young people my age because it was a good opportunity to get to know them on a long train ride. As a child I thought it was ridiculous that they had to ride in a different area of the train.

 

[JohnF]

The trains across the South practiced segregation until the 1960's. However, most of the trains disapeared before the mid 60's so it became a moot point. Amtrak as has been pointed out came into being in 1971 by which time the vast majority of the passenger train system in the US was gone and trains had become irrelevant.

 

[spacecadet]

In the Pullman sleeping car days George M. Pullman forbid his "porters" to wear name badges so it was common, although very degrading, to call every porter "George" for lack of a name tag.

I guess for the same reason one should not refer to doormen as "Carlton".

I don't think the "George" thing was really a racial slur. It's the same as calling a (white) butler "Jeeves" regardless of what his name is. It's classist, but not necessarily racist. If all the porters had been white, they would have still been called "George".

I know there are arguments you can make on both sides (e.g. the porters would have had name tags if they were white, the porters were only all black because they were poor), but to me it just doesn't seem "racist" simply to call a porter by a generic name if you don't know what his name is. It's degrading in a class warfare kind of way, but it's not necessarily racist. Poor whites would have endured the same thing.

btw, when did the name of the occupation change from "porter" to "car attendant"? It must have been around the same time they changed from "stewardess" to "flight attendant". I remember clearly in the movie "Silver Streak", which was something like 1977, they still referred to them as "porters".

 

[access bob]

In the Pullman sleeping car days George M. Pullman forbid his "porters" to wear name badges so it was common, although very degrading, to call every porter "George" for lack of a name tag.

I guess for the same reason one should not refer to doormen as "Carlton".

I don't think the "George" thing was really a racial slur. It's the same as calling a (white) butler "Jeeves" regardless of what his name is. It's classist, but not necessarily racist. If all the porters had been white, they would have still been called "George".

I know there are arguments you can make on both sides (e.g. the porters would have had name tags if they were white, the porters were only all black because they were poor), but to me it just doesn't seem "racist" simply to call a porter by a generic name if you don't know what his name is. It's degrading in a class warfare kind of way, but it's not necessarily racist. Poor whites would have endured the same thing.

btw, when did the name of the occupation change from "porter" to "car attendant"? It must have been around the same time they changed from "stewardess" to "flight attendant". I remember clearly in the movie "Silver Streak", which was something like 1977, they still referred to them as "porters".

I think Amtrak pretty much changed all the names when they arrived to create a new image, took a bit for it all to happen but they were trying to give passenger trains a new image

Bob

 

[had8ley]

In the Pullman sleeping car days George M. Pullman forbid his "porters" to wear name badges so it was common, although very degrading, to call every porter "George" for lack of a name tag.

I guess for the same reason one should not refer to doormen as "Carlton".

I don't think the "George" thing was really a racial slur. It's the same as calling a (white) butler "Jeeves" regardless of what his name is. It's classist, but not necessarily racist. If all the porters had been white, they would have still been called "George".

I know there are arguments you can make on both sides (e.g. the porters would have had name tags if they were white, the porters were only all black because they were poor), but to me it just doesn't seem "racist" simply to call a porter by a generic name if you don't know what his name is. It's degrading in a class warfare kind of way, but it's not necessarily racist. Poor whites would have endured the same thing.

btw, when did the name of the occupation change from "porter" to "car attendant"? It must have been around the same time they changed from "stewardess" to "flight attendant". I remember clearly in the movie "Silver Streak", which was something like 1977, they still referred to them as "porters".

I don't think I implied anything racist~ just the fact that the porters were restricted in what pax called them.(A lot of people just took it for granted that they didn't mind being called George as Pullman was a very successful person: my grandfather was one and he refused to travel by air.) Sometime, if you have extra time, look up the Pullman book of rules; it was a doozie and I'm afraid they would not be able to do business today as they would be in court 24 & 7. Just for modern day analogy; how many people would want to be called by another name other than their own knowing that your own company would not let anyone know your real name? The term "porter" was supposed to die with the Pullman Company but it's hard to break a habit that lasted for a lot of years.

 

[AlanB]

btw, when did the name of the occupation change from "porter" to "car attendant"? It must have been around the same time they changed from "stewardess" to "flight attendant". I remember clearly in the movie "Silver Streak", which was something like 1977, they still referred to them as "porters".

Silver Streak was not represented as Amtrak. The name of the railroad was AmRoad. Besides movie makers take all sorts of liberties with things. They may not have even bothered to find out what attendants were being called at the time that movie was filmed.

Another liberty being taken for example was Gene being knocked off the roof of the train by the signal. One double stack would have taken that signal right out if it was that low. I'm not even sure if a Superliner wouldn't have killed that signal.

 

[Larry H.]

We took the L&N from St. Louis overnight to Memphis in 1963. At that time the train had just been desegregated and I recall the conductor saying that the lights would stay on all night in the coaches due to the recent change in policy. It must have been just short of that they were separate cars. Amusment parks and other public places were still segregated in St. Louis into the mid 60s. I worked at a local large department store in high school and they moved a lady from a position as elevator operator to a sales job on my floor. They had meetings all over the store to explain the policy, and it was the first sales person of color in any major store at the time. When I retired from retailing my store manger was a black woman. So things though not perfect have changed.

 

[ralfp]

I remember divided coaches on the L&N and other railroads back in th 1950s. One end of the coach was for white passengers and the other end for African American passengers.

Where did people from Africa sit?

"White" and "Colored" coaches, waiting rooms, restaurants, etc. in railroad facilities ended legaly in the early 1950's. I think 1954, maybe earlier. At the time the signs saying "White" and "Colored" were painted out on the waiting room doors, even on small town stations that no longer had passenger train service or had no thrain through when the station was open.

Makes me realize that segregation wasn't just a serious injustice, it was a serious waste of resources (perhaps that's also an injustice).

The early 1900 era supreme court decision mentioned, I do not recall its name, required the faciilities to be "seperate but equal" Several of the railroad companies made serious attempts to be sure that happend, others did just enough to stay out of trouble.

Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896)

btw, when did the name of the occupation change from "porter" to "car attendant"? It must have been around the same time they changed from "stewardess" to "flight attendant". I remember clearly in the movie "Silver Streak", which was something like 1977, they still referred to them as "porters".

Perhaps with the resurrection of Porter. Mmmmm... beer.

 

[GG-1]

Silver Streak was not represented as Amtrak. The name of the railroad was AmRoad. Besides movie makers take all sorts of liberties with things. They may not have even bothered to find out what attendants were being called at the time that movie was filmed.

Aloha

Alan's comments about liberties is so true. Just think the train even went through Canada. Some time ago, a friend gave me a Schedule of shooting for that picture. I seem to remember 7 locations for that pictures, not counting 3 different stages in Hollywood.

 

[Joel N. Weber II]

In the Pullman sleeping car days George M. Pullman forbid his "porters" to wear name badges so it was common, although very degrading, to call every porter "George" for lack of a name tag.

I'm not sure I understand how the lack of a name badge makes calling someone by their real name impossible. Probably the majority of people's names I've learned in my lifetime I've learned without the assistance of a name badge.

Were Pullman's employees forbidden from telling a passenger their real name if the passenger asked?

 

[Visitor]

Believe it or not, there are some OBS personnel working for Amtrak who worked on railroads in the 50's and 60's...African Americans, most of them, and they are happy to talk about their experiences working under segregation. Most of them were called George, and sometimes when they get older passengers (apparently for nostalgia's sake) they will actually ask those passengers to refer to them as "George". This is based on my experience on the West Coast, so I'm sure it's similar in the Midwest and South.

 

[oldtimer]

jphjaxfla said

I remember divided coaches on the L&N and other railroads back in th 1950s. One end of the coach was for white passengers and the other end for African American passengers. There was a door in the center of the car dividing those sections. When segregation was finally abolished, the doors were removed, but you could still see where the parititions were in the center of the coach. Some of those L&N coaches were purchased by Amtrak and ran through the late 70s and you could still see the reminants of the partition.

Having worked for Amtrak in 1972 I know that these L & N cars were run on Amtrak and these cars were not "seperate but equal" the front section had plush seat and carpeting also with men's and women's lounges while the reat section which was still behind the dividers but without the door had tile and much thinner seats that didnot recline as far as the more plush seats. The section had two small restrooms ie Amflt I size. They were mainly used on 50.51.58,59, and the Floridian.

 

[Green Maned Lion]

Damn, that should have clicked, and it didn't. I saw in my book of Amtrak car diagrams, L&N (also C&O) cars with divided coach compartments, and couldn't for the life of me figure out why. Now I know.

Man's injustice to his fellow man, historically and presently, will never cease to amaze me.

 

[Bill Haithcoat]

jphjaxfla said

I remember divided coaches on the L&N and other railroads back in th 1950s. One end of the coach was for white passengers and the other end for African American passengers. There was a door in the center of the car dividing those sections. When segregation was finally abolished, the doors were removed, but you could still see where the parititions were in the center of the coach. Some of those L&N coaches were purchased by Amtrak and ran through the late 70s and you could still see the reminants of the partition.

Having worked for Amtrak in 1972 I know that these L & N cars were run on Amtrak and these cars were not "seperate but equal" the front section had plush seat and carpeting also with men's and women's lounges while the reat section which was still behind the dividers but without the door had tile and much thinner seats that didnot recline as far as the more plush seats. The section had two small restrooms ie Amflt I size. They were mainly used on 50.51.58,59, and the Floridian.

I was alive and well during the " bad old days" of segregation. My observations were not quite as much about inferior equipment ( I walked through every car of every train I rode as a child) but about separate lines at the ticket counter. I seem to recall that African Americans had separate waiting rooms and furthermore a separate place to stand to get the attention of the ticket agent. That scared me--no telling how many may have missed their train while the ticket agents pandered to the Whites.

As to the L&N coaches in question (the ones later sold to Amtrak), note that I was alive and well when they were built and saw them many times in my hometown in actual service. FIrst time I boarded one I was disappointed at how spartan its appointments were, (at each end) no carpet,no drapes, very plain. Streamlined, lightweight but very plain. There was never a door between the sections , but always an eched glass partition. No appreciable difference in each section.

I am looking at page 199 of "The Passenger Car Library' Vol. 6 Southeastern Railroads, W. David Randall. Shown is actually a KCS car but no builders photos of L&N available but claimed to be identical, the same lot number 4403.

There were 13 60-seat cars in this order, 11 of them being sold to Amtrak. As built, there were two small restrooms at each end of the car, I personally remember being upset about that as well. See, I was used to the large lounge-- like restrooms such as the earlier (1946) L&N streamlined coaches had. The old restrooms had a waiting room annex which could be used for visiting and smoking, with the toilets being annexed off from that lounge room. One big men's room at one end of the car, one big ladies room at the other end, each about the size of a bedroom.

These cars were ordered 8/54, delivered in 9/55. They just got in on the cusp of segregation becoming illegal.

The irony in a post about segregation is,it is possible these specific 13 cars (even with their glass partition) were never used in a segregated way at all, thus the lack of need for that partition after all. It could, then, in later years, be justified as a decoration to block the"tunnel effect" of a long row of coach seats. That has happened before.

I have no explanation for the memories of others about this. But here is a thought---could it be that Amtrak itself rebuilt the coaches into, maybe, something like what we would today call business class for part of the car?Maybe charged a little more? I don't know but that seems plausable.

 

[spacecadet]

Silver Streak was not represented as Amtrak.

I didn't mean to imply that it was. However, I think that it, like all Hollywood movies (and it was a Hollywood movie that was supposed to be set in the United States, despite being filmed in Canada) would have used common nomenclature at the time that its audience would understand. It's not a period piece and it wasn't geared towards an elderly demographic. If "car attendant" was the common term, that's what would have been in the script.

I was a kid then but I remember people still referring to attendants as porters around that time also. The first time I remember hearing "car attendant" was probably around the mid-1980's.

 

[jphjaxfl]

jphjaxfla said

I remember divided coaches on the L&N and other railroads back in th 1950s. One end of the coach was for white passengers and the other end for African American passengers. There was a door in the center of the car dividing those sections. When segregation was finally abolished, the doors were removed, but you could still see where the parititions were in the center of the coach. Some of those L&N coaches were purchased by Amtrak and ran through the late 70s and you could still see the reminants of the partition.

Having worked for Amtrak in 1972 I know that these L & N cars were run on Amtrak and these cars were not "seperate but equal" the front section had plush seat and carpeting also with men's and women's lounges while the reat section which was still behind the dividers but without the door had tile and much thinner seats that didnot recline as far as the more plush seats. The section had two small restrooms ie Amflt I size. They were mainly used on 50.51.58,59, and the Floridian.

I rode those cars on the L&N up until 1971 and on Amtrak after that. These cars built in 1955 had been refurbished by L&N so both ends of the cars looked exactly the same with the same seats throughout the car. The only reminder that the cars had been built as divided cars were the moldings in the center of the car where the dividing door had one been. Amtrak operated these cars mostly on on the short distance trains out of Chicago as they were not very comfortable for longer distance trips. I rode the Southwind-Floridian many times from 1971 - 1979 and there was never an former L&N car in the consist. The coaches were mostly ex SAL/ACL with a dome coach that was ex GN or NP.

 

[Bill Haithcoat]

jphjaxfla said

I remember divided coaches on the L&N and other railroads back in th 1950s. One end of the coach was for white passengers and the other end for African American passengers. There was a door in the center of the car dividing those sections. When segregation was finally abolished, the doors were removed, but you could still see where the parititions were in the center of the coach. Some of those L&N coaches were purchased by Amtrak and ran through the late 70s and you could still see the reminants of the partition.

Having worked for Amtrak in 1972 I know that these L & N cars were run on Amtrak and these cars were not "seperate but equal" the front section had plush seat and carpeting also with men's and women's lounges while the reat section which was still behind the dividers but without the door had tile and much thinner seats that didnot recline as far as the more plush seats. The section had two small restrooms ie Amflt I size. They were mainly used on 50.51.58,59, and the Floridian.

I rode those cars on the L&N up until 1971 and on Amtrak after that. These cars built in 1955 had been refurbished by L&N so both ends of the cars looked exactly the same with the same seats throughout the car. The only reminder that the cars had been built as divided cars were the moldings in the center of the car where the dividing door had one been. Amtrak operated these cars mostly on on the short distance trains out of Chicago as they were not very comfortable for longer distance trips. I rode the Southwind-Floridian many times from 1971 - 1979 and there was never an former L&N car in the consist. The coaches were mostly ex SAL/ACL with a dome coach that was ex GN or NP.

And the main reason they were not considered comfortable enough for a long trip was undoubtedly because they did not have leg rests.

This is a little known and long forgotten aspect of railroading but full length leg rests, like dome cars for example, were largely built for Chicago to West Coast trains,i.e. Santa Fe, Burlington, lines that. Back east(including the southeast) very few trains had leg rets.

That is one of the things Amtrak ws able to do, spread the goodies around more, things like dome cars and leg rests coaches were all of a sudden all over the place. Amtrak obviously was not restricted to keeping cars on the rails for which they were originally built.

Back to the 13 L&N 1955 cars, I actually have seen them on the SouthWind(later to be called the Floridian) but mostly they were on an L&N train called the Humming Bird,also sometimes the Georgian and the Pan American. As built and when built,they were considered comfortable enough to go from Chicago to New Orleans and Cincinnati to New Orleans. But Amtrak raised the bar, as to leg rest seats, and properly put them on shorter distance trains.