There are rich moments of hobo lore, and then there are occasions like the one that began unfolding in the predawn light of an Iowa rail yard a few weeks ago.
With a growing chorus of birds chirping, the twitch of anxiety was becoming acute in “Milwaukee Mike.” He had been sitting for nearly two hours in the lawn chair he often uses for his recreational – and entirely illegal – freight train rides. His arm was draped on the bar of a parked tanker car.
The eastbound train Mike was expecting to transport him and two companions back to Chicago hadn’t arrived. In fact, he was unsure exactly when it would reach the yard and which of the six or so tracks on either side of him would carry the freight. The morning was starting to feel muggy and bugs were buzzing about him, in search of breakfast.
“This is what I hate about riding freights,” he sighed, and swatted. “The novelty of this stuff wears off. It really does.”
Mike caught his train, a source of temporary glee, when it stopped in the yard to change crews, but it happened to drop him about four miles from his destination, forcing him to walk that distance under a burning sun after a rocky, 12-hour journey without sleep. He ditched the lawn chair.
These are the yarns somehow lost in the romanticized reminiscence of the hobo legend, but they’re good enough for the bull sessions at the North Side Chicago pizza joint where Mike and his kindred spirits meet discreetly every month. They trade stories of their adventures on the rails, plan trips, occasionally welcome visiting hobos and exchange the latest tips on riding the rails for free.
They are the “Loco Motives.” Have lawn chairs, will travel.
Mike has given the group its name, though they hardly look as if they’ve earned the distinction. They are a modest collection: a wispy college philosophy professor, an advertising executive from the suburbs, a spectacled medical professional, and Mike, a sales engineer with a wife and grown son and daughter.
Let appearances not mislead, however. These affable men are railroad renegades, part of the legacy of the disappearing hobo culture and a small social group in the large, lawbreaking contingent that railway companies would like to terminate with extreme prejudice. They’re called Recreational Hobos.
“It’s illegal to ride freight trains?” asked Mike, 56, with deadpan demeanor. “It’s hardly a serious crime,” he added. Mike, like the other rail riders, agreed to talk about his adventures publicly only with the promise of anonymity.
“And I think the only reason the railroads make it illegal is to protect themselves,” he said.
It is definitely about protection, freight officials say. Protection of railroad property and personnel, protection of customers’ shipments and, most important, protection of human life.
“We’re very sensitive and very appreciative of people who hold the railroad in a special place in their hearts,” said Patrick Carter, police chief of the Santa Fe Railway, “and we think it’s great that they want to preserve that, but the way to do it is not to illegally trespass on railroad property and hop freights. It’s analogous to appreciating airplanes and standing on a runway while DC-10s take off and land.”
Added John Fitzpatrick, spokesman for the Federal Railroad Administration in Washington, D.C.: “I would characterize recreational hoboing as undoubtedly an illegal, dangerous and stupid act. It boggles my mind why people would risk their lives, regardless of the romantic images conjured up in hobo lore.”
Call of the rod
The philosophy professor knows why, but even he struggles to find the right words to describe the allure of the rails.
“If you were to press me, I’d say there’s a sense of independence,” said the 51-year-old professor, husband and father who carries the road name “Oats.” “There’s the awe-evoking character of the movement of the freight train, that you’re in the presence of something much larger than yourself, and the sense of being alone.”
And, while the illegality bothers him, he contends that he and his friends are harmless.
“We don’t do anything terrible,” Oats said. “We don’t vandalize. We don’t pull the pins on cars. We don’t harm anything. We don’t bother anyone. We just ride.”
Before they get blamed for encouraging a recreation that severs limbs and splatters bodies, the Loco Motives would like to acknowledge that this mode of travel can be hard, noisy, dirty and uncertain.
Another thing: Riding freight trains constitutes trespassing and, while it is unevenly enforced, conviction on such a charge could yield a $1,000 fine and up to six months in jail.
Typically, rail police say, a trespasser is fined several hundred dollars and may be kept in jail for a few days, but rail riders say severe penalties rarely are enforced and punishment most often amounts to being shagged off railroad property. Many times, riders say, rail yard employees are cooperative and almost collegial, as long as they determine the rider is a sane individual who just enjoys the recreation of hopping a freight.
Riding freights also can be extremely dangerous, particularly if a rider chooses to jump on or off a moving freight train. Statistics from the Federal Railroad Administration show that trespasser fatalities – deaths of people who are illegally on railroad property – are steadily increasing and totaled 529 last year.
The Loco Motives say they hop on or remove themselves from trains that are standing still. Those members who say they have tried to jump from even slow-moving trains quickly point out that they narrowly escaped serious injury and they vow never to try it again.
The critical element is how to find freights that are stationary, and the Loco Motives have taken care of that too. They have acquired an extremely thorough underground guide to crew change points – those spots along the rails where trains stop to allow a fresh crew aboard – and the men conduct their own research during their travels.
The guide also contains information about where most of the freights are traveling, though a rail rider’s timetable must be extremely flexible – freights can stop and sit for an hour or more in the middle of nowhere – and open to missing specific destinations.
Other useful nuggets, including what to bring on a ride and preferred cars for riding, are provided in the guide. One of the most comfortable spots is the four-feet-deep wells on “double stack”cars.
Large containers are stacked and locked into place on the cars, which resemble long, narrow bathtubs on wheels. The positioning of the containers leaves a well at one end that typically measures about 5- by 8-feet – perfect for a couple of lawn chairs and their occupants.
Rail truths aren’t pretty
Along with the lawn chair, some riders also like to bring cotton balls to stuff in their ears. The trains groan and rock and let out a metallic screech that can be as frightening as it is exhilarating. Grime is a constant companion, picked up from everything you touch. Remember, porters do not clean these compartments after every trip to Carbondale.
And, in most cars, hobos are largely at the mercy of the weather. Winds can rush through the compartment as the freights hit speeds of up to 55 miles an hour, making sturdy layers of clothes flap as if they were flimsy flags in a stiff winter gust.
Temperatures are exaggerated. If it’s sunny, you can bake on the metal cars. If it’s chilly and you lack padding as a shield from the car floor, it can feel as if you’re sitting on a large, frozen TV dinner tray.
Oh, and by the way, forget about potty breaks while riding, unless you lug a bulky plastic jug and are extraordinarily agile, or want to risk a most humiliating obituary.
The problems definitely take a bit of the luster off the romantic imagery of riding the rails and living the vagabond life, but they contribute something to the sense of adventure, rail riders say. The views from freight trains can be magnificent, dreamlike and poignant – in a small way comparable to rolling along the back roads in a convertible with someone else driving.
The olfactory sensations – from fresh rain and crops to diesel smoke and skunks – also add a rich layer to the travel experience. And you can’t beat the price.
“It’s almost like it’s an escape,” said Leo, the 53-year-old suburban advertising executive, husband and father of two grown children. “You get on a train and all of your troubles are gone. You don’t have to think of the day-to-day problems. You just have to think about what’s ahead at the next stop and enjoy.”
Always fascinated by freight trains, Leo for years “rode the cushions” of Amtrak, subscribed to Hobo Times magazine, which calls itself “America’s Journal of Wanderlust,” and wondered. Finally, after hooking up with the Loco Motives in 1993, he took his first ride.
Since then, Leo has seen Wisconsin, Iowa, Colorado and Utah from freight trains. This year, he and Mike rode the rails and hitchhiked from Vancouver to Calgary, where Leo’s love of the hobo life ran dry. Rather than following the original plan of riding freights all the way back to Chicago, he booked a flight and paid $537.
Leo has logged plenty of miles and experiences, but he remains a neophyte compared with the most mysterious member of the group. Known as “Doc,” he refuses to talk publicly about his experiences, but has the most to share.
Doc has traveled more than 200,000 miles on freight trains, including visits to at least 47 states and five Canadian provinces. It was Doc who, upon moving to the Chicago area about two years ago, obtained a mailing list from Hobo Times and sent postcards to rail enthusiasts in the area, notifying them that he was planning to start the informal club.
The meetings at times have swelled to nearly 20 people crowded around a few tables at the restaurant, but more often, the three or four hard-core hobos sit around getting caught up on one another’s travels.
Chicago drew hobos
The Loco Motives may not know it, but their hometown was considered the Hobo Capital of the World, according to the book “Hoboes: Wandering in America, 1870-1940,” by Richard Wormser. The reason: Chicago was – and still is – a hub for trains traveling all over the U.S.
Hobos generally gravitated toward the large cities during the winter, and Chicago housed 300,000 to 500,000 hobos a year in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Wormser wrote.
Derivation of the word hobo remains a mystery, according to Wormser. Some say it stems from the Latin “homo bonus,” which means “good man.” Others claim it was shortened from the greeting “hello brother,” and another theory contends that it describes a farm job, “hoe-boy.”
Hobos, the popularized figure of a man wandering the country on the railroads looking for work, have their roots in the Industrial Revolution and development of the railroads that boomed after the Civil War, according to Wormser. By 1910, Wormser wrote, 3 million of the estimated 10 million unskilled workers in America were migratory hobos.
The number of actual hobos has declined dramatically, however, since the Great Depression, widespread use of the automobile and World War II combined to nearly eradicate the ranks of unskilled workers traveling on freights.
No one knows for sure the number of hobos riding the rails today, but the Hobo Times column “Hobo Telegraph” quoted the “Operation Iron Horse III” study by the Southern Pacific police and the U.S. Border Patrol in which authorities in 1991 removed 45 U.S. citizens after inspecting 333 trains. That amounts to about one transient rider on every seven freights.
National Hobo Association Director Bobb “Santa Fe Bo” Hopkins extrapolated that figure to conclude that 5,000 to 10,000 people are riding freight trains illegally in the U.S., though he said it’s impossible to determine the number of real and recreational hobos.
The Loco Motives – one of at least a half-dozen such groups in the country – may be part of that resurgence, but more likely they are a combination hobo historical society and recreational club.
“Cub,” a 21-year-old drama student from Fordham University, was a recent guest at one of the group’s meetings, and is perhaps exemplary of the nouveau appreciation for the hobo life.
His interest in riding freight trains started a couple of years ago, when he read “Tales of the Iron Road,” the biography of “Steam Train” Maury Graham, and started jotting down notes about riding freights.
In the summer of 1993, he cajoled a friend to ride with him to Albany. The next summer, they took the same trip, were thrown out of the rail yard and caught a bus to the granddaddy of hobo gatherings, the Hobo Convention in Britt, Iowa. This year’s festival, which is expected to draw upwards of 10,000 to 12,000 people, is set for Aug. 10 through 12 and will be the 95th celebration.
“More than anything, an actor is somewhat of an anthropologist and I’m fascinated by the culture,” Cub said. “A lot of the thrill of this is learning about this subculture of people who defected from society, but it’s more than that. It’s wanderlust.”
He has been able to weave some of those emotions into a three-character play, in which a demigod tempts the two other characters with the lure of the road.
“As realistic as it is,” he said of freight riding, “it’s just as romantic.”
KEEPING TRACK OF FREIGHT-HOPPER LINGO
Here, courtesy of Hobo Times magazine, is a partial glossary of hobo vernacular:
Angel food: Mission food after listening to a sermon.
Beanery: Railroad coffee shop.
Blowed-in-the-glass: A professional hobo.
Bone polisher: Mean dog.
Boomer: Migratory worker.
Bull: Railroad detective.
Catch out: Hop a freight.
Clover kicker: Farmer.
Dog train: Slow freight.
Frisco circle: A circle drawn in the dirt, into which hobos contribute money.
Gator flats: Florida.
Hog: Locomotive.
Hotshot: Fast freight.
Jolt: Jail sentence.
Lump: Handout.
Midnight zipper: Fast night train.
Mop stick: Barfly.
Pear diver: Dishwasher.
Poodle: Town marshall.
Pound the ear: To sleep.
Rubber tramp: Tramp who travels by car.
Saddle blankets: Hot cakes.
Shakeytown: Los Angeles.
Side-door pullman: Boxcar.
Slave market: Employment agency.
Slides: Shoes.
Splinter belly: Carpenter.
Stem: Street.
Stew bum: Old-timer wasted by booze.
Tap city: Broke.
Tangled-in-the-vine: Go on an extended drinking binge.
Teapot: Locomotive.
Throw the feet: Beg.
Unit: Diesel engine.
Weed patch: Hobo jungle.
