Tramps, Hoboes & Bums...

 ...was a nickname for the Toronto, Hamilton & Buffalo Railway. To Hell & Back was another! Locally we have the Kick & Push moniker for the Kingston & Pembroke Railway. But those three names in this post title were also applied to a class of men who found it more profitable to beg than to work, throughout the early 20th-Century. 

For various reasons, be they employment, economic, criminal, desperation or just of options, these men 'rode the rods' or 'rode the bumpers'. Steel truss rods were used to stiffen the underframe of freight cars, to enable them to carry heavier loads and keep them cambered upwards. They also provided a horizontal space below a freight car that could be temporarily inhabited.

The recent death of well-known Youtube Hobo Shoestring got me thinking about whether hoboes were ever an issue in Kingston. Yes, they were! And not just during the Great Depression.  (I've already modelled homeless settlements in my modelled era circa 1970.)

KINGSTON PAN-HANDLING EXPERIMENT

In 1933, during the height of the Great Depression, a Whig reporter was sent to various locations to talk with the hoboes and those they attempted to beg money from. He found a man on Arch Street selling bars of soap to buy tobacco. A man on Collingwood Street said he had eaten no food in three days. 

The reporter next went to the CN Outer Station 'Jungle' (the vernacular name for a temporary hobo settlement, often where rides on trains were caught). He found five men waiting for a freight, gathered around one of several campfires burning in the Jungle, though the one that was passing was too fast to jump aboard. The men said they got food from the House of Providence, and provided guidance on how to beg effectively:

• take off your socks, beg for socks. The proponent received seven pair and $1.
• have long hair, beg for money for a haircut. This man made $2.25.
• play up a broken shoulder from falling off a train.
• claim to be a church person, show your Bible. This man made 25 cents.
• ask, "Can you spare a nickel for a cup of coffee?", "Can you spare a few cents? I'm starved" or, "Can you spare a few cents toward a bed for the night?

The reporter found Kingstonians not all that generous, though finding punishments for vagrants were less severe than in the big cities. Grocery stores handed out 'odds & ends'. It was best to beg before the target's meal time than after. The reporter then tried out all the recommended methods. His results:

• one-third of targets told him to go to the police station or Barriefield unemployment camp
• one-third of targets gave (two pairs of sock, one-half pack of cigarettes, 10 cents)
• one-third gave nothing.

KINGSTON PAN-HANDLING PRESS ACCOUNTS

I found multiple accounts in Whig clippings, reaching back to 1908.

OCTOBER 2, 1908 - Seven vagrants found in Tait's 40x16-foot hay mow on Montreal Street were forced out with pitchforks by six 'bluecoats' led by Inspector Arniel: "Come out of there, you beggars!" eliciting no tine casualties. Earlier, two men on Montreal Street had been approached by two tough-looking characters demanding money.

• George Conway was working near Grass Creek, remanded for four days.
• David Purtell was down by the Outer Station, fined $2 or 15 days.
• James Ryan dropped off the steamer TORONTO, fined $1 or 10 days.
• Cornelius Monaghan, the 'daddy' of the party, came to Kingston from Montreal two weeks ago, fined $5 or 1 month.
• George McKenzie was fined $5 or 1 month.
• Alfred Marsh was visiting friends on York Street, planning to go back to Toronto, remanded for four days.

APRIL 15, 1908 - Quarrymen working near the then-Grand Trunk Railway Outer Station had their dinner pails taken: food, pails and all. There was a group of hoboes in barns nearby.

APRIL 29, 1910 - Eight hoboes were put behind bars, six receiving terms of ten days to one month. They had 44 cents between them. They were using iodoform and 'court-plaster' bandages to elicit the sympathy of their begging targets:

• Frank Murphy pleaded guilty to drunkenness and vagrancy when found lying on the tracks at Bailey's Broom Factory.
• Martin Black was unable to work due to a swollen, inflamed hand. He received three weeks - time to have his hand doctored by the jail physician.
• Michael Sheridan was selling court plasters, not begging. Sentenced to two weeks.
• John Tompkins was saucy when arrested by Constable Taylor and Sergeant Nesbitt. He and two companions were found hiding behind a boxcar at the Outer Station.
• William Curry was working his way from Montreal to Toronto to take a place on the steamer DUNDURN. Ten days.
• John Rourke was heading for work in Napanee. Twenty days.
• Louis Siegel showed he was working on the steamer CORNELIUS so was released.
• Joseph Laponte had a position waiting on steamer HAMILTON. If his story held out, he would be released from his remand.

MAY 20, 1914 - Vagrants James Miller, Henry Dorsey and James McKay arrived at the Outer Station on an eastbound freight train, promptly arrested by Constables Batson, Cotter and Nicholson. They had been working east with a gang of six who continued east, possibly robbers. The men were taken by the constables into the city aboard the Suburban train. They were badly in need of a bath, having encountered the cinders along the way. They were charged with vagrancy, $5 plus costs for each. 

JULY 31, 1920 - GTR foreman A. Deshene, working on an extra gang near the Outer Station, found money and article missing from his boxcar boarding car. Petty thieving had been noted to be increasing, with a corresponding increase in the number of hoboes securing transportation without paying fares.

In 1925, following the murder of JP Calkin at Walsh, Alberta, Canadian Pacific was cracking down on hoboes 'riding the bumpers'. There were more hoboes in Western Canada in the spring preceding seeding, and in the fall, preceding harvest.

In 1931, the increasing number of private automobiles on the road led to more hitchhiking than riding freight trains. Trucks had No Passengers/No Riders signs. Hoboes were often winked at, and not encouraged during the unemployment conditions of the Great Depression. One young man said he had been out of work all summer, had been to the Pacific Coast plus Kingston-Toronto trips on his 'boxcar Pullman'. He noted the boxcar was not half-bad, but there was always the danger of falling under the moving train.

AUGUST 25, 1932 - Two carloads of provincial and city police were went to Kingston Junction (the Outer Station) to root out a dozen men camping on railway property. Get moving or go to jail, they were told.

FEBRUARY 5, 1934 - Thirty hoboes were stealing rides out of Kingston Junction and were ordered out of the then-CN yards.

AUGUST 19, 1935 - Contable Monahan of the RCMP apprehended Percy Robertson, Gordon Shenks and Gordon Thompson - three men riding the rails from St Catharines to Campbellton, NB. Each was assessed $10 plus costs or ten days in jail by Kingston's Magistrate Shea.

In early 1936, a larger number of transients was noted riding the rods, despite cold weather.

JULY 27, 1936 - Belleville Police arrested three men for Kingston, and Kingston reciprocated arresting two men for Belleville. Armand Paquin and Leo Wilson were charged with housebreaking in Belleville, stealing a guitar, binoculars, blanket and clothing (some wet and surmised to be off an outdoor clothesline). Their eastbound freight was met by CN Detective James Graham plus Kingston constables Platz and Murphy. Locked up in Kingston, they were to be taken to Belleville.

OCTOBER 8, 1938 - Reginald Tynes of no fixed address had been riding the rails all summer between Oshawa and Cornwall before stopping in Kingston. CN Constable George Foster arrested him on vagrancy charges and he was remanded four days.

In early 1940, railway police reported fewer men riding the rails. Men were enlisting for World War II, and industries were hiring for war production. "Only the real hard-boiled knights of the road who never work", were still out there, noted a railway policeman. Kingston saw only three dozen men per week, down from 300 men per week not long ago.

Two years later, in September 1942, the number of road-knights was again fewer due to the war. Transients had to register in the National Selective Service program, which halved the number of hoboes due to the prosperity of wartime! When asking for overnight accommodation, a man was asked for his NSS registration card. Police would feed breakfast to very old or very young transients. It was no longer a glamorous life. Some statistics on transient numbers were given. In 1938-39 there were 4-5 per day. By February, 1942 there were only 67 all month. In June, 1942 only 10 sought shelter for the night. That number was 25 in July and 22 in August.

 

It's interesting to note that the accounts centre on the east-west intercity GTR/CN line, not the north-south  K&P/CP trackage. The CP trains would have been much, much shorter therefore much harder to hop and ride undetected!

Though there had long been indigent men (winos) living around the Inner Harbour, many inhabiting boat houses.