(The following story by Joe Ruff appeared on the Omaha World-Herald website on May 8.)
OMAHA, Neb. — Raymond Willis and several other African-Americans in Omaha are being honored for their role in the history of blacks on the railroad — as porters for Union Pacific Corp. during the heyday of passenger travel.
Carrying luggage, making beds in sleeping cars and shining shoes while nattily dressed in starched coats and pressed trousers, blacks worked as porters at below-average wages for decades, beginning after the Civil War.
Whites held more lucrative railroad jobs as engineers and conductors, and they were regularly relieved with crew shift changes. Porters often worked 18 hours straight or longer and were expected to remain awake throughout.
“They had inspectors on the train. If they caught you sleeping, you were written up for it,” Willis said of his time as a chair car porter from 1963 though 1966. Chair cars had room for luggage and rows of seats that could be leaned back for resting, while sleeping cars had beds.
Over several decades, porters battled for better wages and working conditions, organizing the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters in 1925. The Brotherhood fought for recognition until 1937, when it became the first African-American union to sign a collective-bargaining agreement with a major U.S. corporation, the Pullman Co., which made and staffed the first sleeping cars.
Today’s national passenger railroad corporation, Amtrak, is recognizing the hard work and legacy of retired and deceased porters who worked for the Pullman Co. and porters who worked directly for railroads like Union Pacific.
The events include a train trip at Amtrak’s expense Friday from Omaha to Chicago’s Union Station for a Saturday reunion that will include a breakfast and afternoon recognition ceremony.
A similar gathering was held in February in Washington, D.C., and a third gathering is planned in September in San Francisco.
Willis, Terry Edwards and John Newsome, all of Omaha, worked for Union Pacific as chair car porters in the 1960s and plan to attend the ceremony in Chicago.
Racism and segregation remained overt when the three worked primarily over the summers as chair car porters, but wages were good. They attended college in the months they were not working.
Their responsibilities on the trains included helping people board, taking care of their luggage and keeping the cars and restrooms clean.
“It was crazy money,” said Edwards, 63. “We would stay out on a run for two or three days at a time. Lots of times we’d bring in $1,000 paychecks while others brought in $150.”
Edwards went to Omaha University, now the University of Nebraska at Omaha, and was a starting linebacker on the football team. He used money earned as a porter to buy an automobile and pay for his schooling.
Working as a porter taught him a great deal, Edwards said.
“It helped you become more patient with people who didn’t realize they were offensive,” Edwards said. “People in service take the brunt of people’s frustration, anger.”
At times it was difficult to remain calm in the face of racially offensive remarks, but it was necessary in order to keep the job and not let down others in the black community who were working on nonviolent responses, Edwards said.
“Sometimes you’d go in the bathroom and kick the door, throw water on yourself to calm down,” Edwards said. “It was an assault on our dignity.”
After graduating, Edwards spent nearly 40 years in sales and marketing. Now he has written and is selling a book on phonics for children.
Edwards said that as a porter he didn’t particularly care for cleaning up messy railroad cars, but he enjoyed the travel and working with his friends, including fraternity brothers and football teammates.
The trip to Chicago this week was important as memories of the porter era fade, Edwards said. “My group of men is the last group that really experienced this,” he said.
Willis, 62, said he and his wife came from railroad families that go back several generations. His father worked for 37 years at Union Pacific, retiring as a steward on business railroad cars of then-Union Pacific President John Kenefick. An uncle was killed in a train accident while working on a Union Pacific passenger train in 1939, Willis said.
Willis and Edwards worked in railcars on trains that went as far as the West Coast. Newsome generally worked on a run from Omaha to Denver. “That was the job of all jobs,” Newsome said. “If you could get a job on the railroad, you were in the cotton. You had arrived.”
Newsome, 61, went on to work for 23 years in various positions for the telephone company as it evolved from Northwestern Bell to Qwest Communications. Newsome now sells health and home-cleaning products.
Willis said the money was good for someone who was 18 years old, and the job was interesting. “It was the first time ever I was away from home,” Willis said.
Willis left the railroad for several years and returned to Union Pacific in 1974 to work in supply, claims, accounting, public relations and marketing departments in Omaha. He retired from Union Pacific in 1994 and now works part time as a teacher’s aide in the Omaha Public Schools.
Willis and Newsome said they were pleased to travel to Chicago, and they wished more people who were Pullman porters throughout their careers — and who often had little opportunity for advancement — remained alive to be recognized.
“It’s unfortunate that the real warriors didn’t have a chance to be honored,” Willis said.