Ep 42: Black Porters” created one of OUR LEGAL HOLIDAYS

LABOR DAY WEEKEND - THE END OF SUMMER...was started by a strike, for not acknowledging a group that most of us don’t realize we are celebrating today., BLACK PULLMAN PORTERS, A contributor that helped benefit Americans greatest growing industry : TRANSPORTATION, DISRUPTED by a dark battle over labor rights. The win was commensurated by OUR NATIONAL HOLIDAY A history of how previous slaves, and black railroad triumphed change for the industry...

B Daht explains more about LABOR DAY, A national historical Black History Fact.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Listen, black folks are the reason we have Labor Day
as a holiday. And I didn't know. Maybe you didn't either,
I didn't know. Maybe you didn't get. I didn't know.
Maybe you didn't get I didn't know. Maybe you didn't
get I didn't I didn't know. I didn't know. I
didn't know. Now I know y'all celebrate Labor Day weekend.

(00:21):
It marks the end of Summerphores, But I had no
clue how it originally started with the black Pullman porters
and the black Pullman porters strike. See, many folks just
like me didn't know about black pulman porter contributions. A
lot of their contributions have been erased from Black American
history altogether. I know, first you're asking what the hell
is a pullman porter? But listen, during the heyday of

(00:42):
railroad travel, you know those guys that got on the
suits and the hats and they help you with your luggage,
Well those are porters. Now, they were called Pullman porters
because they worked for the Pullman Company, and the Pullman
Company created the railroad cars. Now, there were white pullman porters,
but the black Pullman porters were hired mainly because of
their former slave backgrounds. The white man knew that they

(01:02):
knew servitude and they were cheapersa hell because they were
just coming out of slavery. Oh, and their servitude jobs
consisted of babysitting, shining shoes, cleaning up after passengers, laundry making,
bed cooking, you know the same things that they did
pretty much on the plantations, fresh out of slavery, finally
free with a job. You know, them black folks was

(01:22):
working hard and they were dedicated like hell to their jobs.
But they were underpaid, overworked, and they were constantly presented
with racism at work. Now in the switch got flipped.
The black workers wages was already low, but the Pullman
company cut them lower, didn't reduce their rent or any
other charges that blacks had who were already poor. I'm
talking about nineties rapper on bad boy, label poor and

(01:46):
fresh out of slavery. Man. When the workers tried to
present their grievances to the president of Pullman Company, George M. Pullman,
you know, to complain about the low wages, the poor
living conditions, the sixteen hour work days, he refused to
meet with them and fired all of them. After that,
three thousand black railroad workers went rogue. They had a
walk out protests sick of these little bit of checks man.

(02:07):
That showdown between the American railroads and the Pullman company
severely disrupted any rail traffic and service going on. And
this went on for a little minute, got very violent,
very physical, very bloody. The government's response was Congress creating
the national holiday known today as Labor Day. Can you
believe that? And once folks realized that, then black pullman

(02:29):
porters were needed. Their pay also improved. Then the black
folks got even smarter. Because the black porters were the
ones who were traveling the country extensively. They were able
to get news from different spots, developed ideas from different spots,
and bring them back to their own communities. And then
you think about it, then black pullman porters on these
long train rides with these wealthy whites, that got a

(02:50):
chance to see the clear differences between them white folks
lives and then black pullman porters lives. They start getting smarter, investing,
buying land, listening to the whites when they were serving them.
You see, the pullman porters were trained on them plantations
to mostly serve and never speak, to be seen and
never heard. Many of the porters saved up money to

(03:11):
send their children and their grandchildren to college, to buy homes,
purchase land, start businesses back home, and digg it. When
the black pullman porters sent their children and grandchildren to schools,
many of them went on to become outstanding figures in
totally different fields, from law like Supreme Court justice Third
Good Marshal, to sports like Olympic track star Wilma Rudolph.

(03:33):
Three thousand black railroad workers in eight invented the phrase
find somebody else to do it, and Congress messed around
and created Labor Day. Remember that when you're celebrating in September.
Because I didn't know, maybe you didn't either.