Oral Histories: R

Darwin Rawson (DR) Interview Transcript

INTERVIEWER: What made you decide to work for the Railway Mail Service?

DR: What made me decide? Because it paid better wages than what I was getting [laughs]. Got a raise in pay, mainly.

INTERVIEWER: Can you tell me a little bit about a typical day for you? When you would go to work, what you would wear, the hours you would work, that sort of thing?

DR: Yah when I went to work, I lived in Burlington, Iowa, and usually we headed out of Omaha or Chicago, so that’d be the first thing we’d have to do, was to deadhead into Omaha or Chicago, whichever you were assigned to. So we’d get in there, and then most of the time I’d go up, change your clothes, get in the RPO, hang the racks, put your headers out for letters, then wait ‘til the mail [?] brought the mail down, start tossing the RPO. Then we’d take the locks off of ‘em, dump ‘em on the table, sort ‘em out. The terminal usually had them tied up into working mail and directs, you know. Direct was all the letters that were going to Chicago or Detroit, someplace like that, you know. And the working ones, well they had a clerk there had to work ‘em down, break it down into smaller towns. The big towns were already pulled out of ‘em. That’s about it.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. Can you tell me about the conditions on the trains?

DR: Well, summertime it was hot ‘cause there was no air conditioning. Winter time was cold, we had heat, but it wasn’t too bad. Summertime was when it got bad, when it got hot, no air conditioning in ‘em. ‘Cause they were real warm. And then you had to watch, swinging back and forth, you know rocking back and forth, that kind of stuff. But it wasn’t too bad, really, after you got used to it.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. Did you have a hard time getting along with anyone at first, early on?

DR: You mean, giving you a bad time? Well, when you’re a rookie they all did that. Yeah [laughs]. They let you know if you’re going too slow or you weren’t learning the case fast enough. When you’re breaking the mail down and like they had more RPO’s, certain towns went to certain RPO’s and this kind of stuff, you had to learn the schemes, and if you didn’t know that too good they’d get on you. That kind of stuff, that’s about it mainly.

INTERVIEWER: What was your favorite part of the job?

DR: What was my favorite part? Working 4 days and getting 8 days off [laughs]. No, sorting mail was pretty good. I didn’t mind that at all.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything you really did not like about it? DR: Well mainly being away from home, that was the main thing. INTERVIEWER: Did you have family at the time.

DR: Yes. Because I had what they called a job that headed out of Chicago, I’d work 4 days on and 8 days off, so that wasn’t too bad.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember ever running into any dangerous situations?

DR: The only one I can remember is, some fella was going up, I believe the town was Osceola, Iowa I think. Anyway he’d always walk through town, they said to us later at breakfast that this morning we was coming through there, we didn’t slow down too much for the town because they didn’t put no mail out and he wandered out in front of us. That’s when we nailed him. That was the only bad thing. And then the engineer was hitting the breaks to avert hitting him, you know. Well that threw us around quite a bit. But other than that that was the only time that anything like that ever happened, luckily.

INTERVIEWER: Do you have any other stories from the Railway Mail Service, anything funny that ever happened or unusual that you remember?

DR: Uh, not right off hand, no, I can’t think of nothing. Because usually you just got on there and went to work.

INTERVIEWER: With the on the fly mail did you ever see someone throw a bag in the wrong place or anything like that?

DR: Uh, yeah I’ve seen that. I used to dispatch the mail too, nonstop off the train, you know you’d throw t he pouch off and catch, yeah. I used to do that. That was kind of, oh it could be a little hairy sometimes, sticking your head out the door there, trying to see where the pouch is coming, and went to put the arm up to catch it.

Benjamin Roberts (BR) Interview Transcript

INTERVIEWER: What made you decide to work for the Railway Mail Service?

BR: Well I started out, I went to machinist school and did that kind of work, even when I was in the military and a friend that I worked with told me about a neighbor of his that worked for Railway Mail, and it seemed real interesting, so I got a hold of the man that gives the exams and that’s… went from there. That was in nineteen forty, in the fall of 1946, and I went to work in June, ’47. And I run from Cincinnati to Hinton, West Virginia, that was half-way to DC. And then another crew got on and they took it to DC and they came back to Hinton, and we came back to Cincinnati.

INTERVIEWER: Can you tell me about the sort of hours you would work, if you would work on day trains or night trains?

BR: Well, they had different trains running out. Cincinnati was kind of a base terminal for the Railway Mail and they had trains going all different times. I run on the day train for a while, and then I switched over to the night train because they got, made more money on the night train. On our line they had three trains that hauled the mail every day in and out. They had a local train and two fast trains. And back in the middle ‘60s they started flying  a lot of the first class mail, and when they started doing that, well they started cutting RPO’s off the trains. And they got down to us in ’66 and they cut, when they cut our trains off we could bid according to seniority off the ones that was left. And I run to Cincinnati then to St. Louis, I got on that run. ‘Til April, the next April, ’67, then they cut that one off. And then they had a train on the B&O that went up through northern West Virginia to DC, so I run from Cincinnati to Grafton, ‘til August ’68, and I was on the last RPO into Cincinnati. But at one time Cincinnati, it was just like a wagon wheel. You know, RPO’s running. They had two lines to Chicago from here, they have Cleveland, Pittsburgh and then Norfolk and Western, and then our line was called Wash and Cin, and then down through Kentucky they had Cin and Knox, Cin and Chat, Cin and Nash, so that’s the way it was and they kept the mail going all the time, they didn’t have sectional centers like they got now. So, then I worked 11 years over in the Cincinnati sectional center ‘til I retired.

INTERVIEWER: Was it very sad to be on that last run into Cincinnati?

BR: Yeah, it was. But the mail that they was, they were starting to ship all the mail to the sectional centers around the country and our mail that we hauled on the train was down to nothing almost. But a few trains run longer up in New England, New York, Washington and that area up in there. There’s a few RPO’s that hung on for a little longer, but I can’t tell you when the last one up there run. But it wasn’t too long after that.

INTERVIEWER: What was your favorite thing about working for the Railway Mail Service?

BR: Well, one of my favorite things was my time off. We had all kinds of runs. We got so much time for preparing the slips and labels that we used, so the last run I had when they took the Cin off, I run 6 days on and 8 off. And me and my family, we got into camping pretty heavy with the children, and we had several different campers and like in the summertime when they was out of school we did a lot of traveling around. That made it better. And then we used to get an expense account, and if I run the night line I got more money than to run the day line. Plus we got 10 percent increase on our salary. But I loved the job, it was a challenge. You know, the first year I was in, subbed for one year, and I had to learn 2,100 post offices and I got mine all in in 11 months. And we had, like these exams we had… Kentucky was split in three different sections, and each one of ‘em had around 800 post offices. So then I studied West Virginia, it had 2 sections, 2 exams, Virginia had 2, Indiana was all in 1 and Ohio had 2. That was our studying section for C&O. The Wash and Cin.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember ever running into any danger?

BR: Well, we hit several automobiles in my time out there. I guess the worst one we had, between Portsmouth, Ohio. We was on the Kentucky side between there and Ashland. There was a school up there. And the road crossed the railroad up beyond that school about a mile or two, and there was some kids started racing the train, and they would try to get across that crossing before the train got there. So one day they didn’t make it. There was 2 boys and a girl… of course it tore the automobile all to pieces. It tore the steps off our mail car, just rolled it down the train. Killed all three of ‘em, and they had to take the mail car off in Ashland on account of danger, you know, getting in and out of it. And a few other things. We hit a coal truck up in West Virginia one time, and one time, going into South Charleston, West Virginia, a town this side of Charleston, somebody had laid something on the crossing, like some lumber or something, and that’s when we still run the steam engines. And this was, happened on a Sunday and when the guider wheels on the steam engine hit them it’d throw them off them track. We didn’t start over or get off but the front part of the steam engine was off, and it was one set of wheels was run down inside of the track and, just chopping ‘em up. You know, and we was holding on to the safety bar because the emergency went on and they stopped pretty quick. And well, I wasn’t on the trip coming out of Hinton one time, they’d been having a lot of heavy rain, and they did hit a big boulder come down on the track, and they plowed into that, but it didn’t really hurt any of the clerk. And then we got shot at one time. Yeah we used to stop at St. Albans, West Virginia, that’s between Huntington and Charleston, and anyway somewhere before we got to South Charleston we heard a noise in the front end of the mail car was where they worked the paper, magazines and parcel post. A bullet went through the door window. We all happened to be at the other end of the car. Anyway, the clerk in charge, he reported it to the police when we stopped at Charleston. And they caught some boys down there, had a 22 rifle, they were just shooting at the train. But nobody got hurt.

INTERVIEWER: Then do you have any other stories, maybe something funny or unusual that happened?

BR: Oh well, some of the guys would, you know try to play a trick on somebody or another, something like that. I remember one fellow we had out there. He was a copilot on a B17 and flew missions over Germany. And he used to get sick on the mail car. You know it didn’t ride smooth all the time, you know it’d bounce around. He’d get sick and vomit. And I guess from the motion. It never did bother me, but we had another fellow, he was a substitute, and he’s a big cut up anyway, and we was up in Hinton. We was coming down on Sunday morning. Of course, Sunday the mail was kinda light on Sunday, so anyway he told me, he says, I’m going to make Walter sick down the road. And I said, what do you mean? He said, you just watch me. So we go, we go get on the train, we’re coming down the road, and he was working the paper, newspapers, that and he’d come up in our end of the car, and he’d say, Walter, you feel alright? Walter said, “Yah.” You look pale to me. You know, things like that. Anyway, Walter lived in Ashland, Kentucky. And that was his home, he’d have to deadhead to Cincinnati to go to work. He got off the train at Ashland, he went home. ‘Course we didn’t really need him from there to Cincinnati, but that guy laughed, he said I told you I could make him sick. Just funny things like that. Another thing, we had one fella, he lived here fairly close to where I live, and he was a kind of a jumpy sort of a fella, I don’t think he was too happy with his living situation or something, but the guys would rib him, just to get him stirred up. So anyway, one day we were coming down the train on number one and that was like on a Sunday morning, and we stopped at Ashland. Well this mail handler that brought the mail and took the mail off the train, he used to rib this guy and get him kinda mad. So anyway, we stayed in the station a little bit longer, so this guy did a dumb thing. He put some sacks up on the table where he worked, he got up there and laid down. And this fella happened to walk by the mail handler, and he comes back and knocks on the door. And the fella on the train, he gets up, he’s already mad because he had to get up. He opened the door and this fella says to him, says I want you to know something, I’m a taxpayer and I just don’t feel like you should be laying up there asleep while I’m having to pay your salary. And they got into a big brawl. But everybody laughed about it, you know. Just things like that.

John Robertson Interview Transcript

John Robertson: My name is John Robertson. I went into the mail service a couple of months after I got out of the army, and I spent about a 37- or 38-year career with the postal service. I retired from the government with 40 years of government service in 1980. So I’ve been retired since 1980.

INTERVIEWER: And were you a regular or a sub on the Railway Mail Service?

John Robertson: During the days of the Railway Mail Service, I was a substitute.

INTERVIEWER: And which rail line did you work on and which locations did you travel between?

John Robertson: Well, the couple of years that I was substituting, I was all over the state of Florida, on the seaboard, coastline, what have you. I forgot what the rest of the question was.

INTERVIEWER: The cities that you travelled between?

John Robertson: Well, it was all over the state of Florida.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever travel outside of Florida?

John Robertson: No.

INTERVIEWER: And how long did you serve as a railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: I think I said a couple of years I was substituting and then I went as a regular clerk out at the airport airmail field.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember which years you served as railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: Well, let’s see. I came out of the army -- let's see. D-day was ’44, right?

INTERVIEWER: Yes.

John Robertson: ‘44. Okay, so ‘46. What was the question? ‘46.

INTERVIEWER: What years you served as a railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: ’46 and ’47, I guess. Two years.

INTERVIEWER: And what made you want to become a railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: Well, my dad was a railway mail clerk. He had been running on the train all my growing up years, and so I got out of the army and he had come home from the post office one morning and he said, “Well, have you decided what you’re going to do now that you’re out of the army?” And I said, “Well, I could go get a college education for nothing from Uncle Sam but,” I said, “I don’t know what I would concentrate on, what I’d make it my living to be.” And he said, “Well, Mr. Townsend said if you wanted to come to work in the mail service, you could come down and sign up and he’d put you on the top of the list.” And so I went down the next day and signed up, and the next night I went down to go to work at 11 o’clock and somebody came in from outside and said, “The train’s getting ready to go to Tampa and they’re short of man. You got anybody that can go?” And, well, young Robertson was standing over there ready to go to work at 11 o’clock but this is his first night on the job and they said, “Well, he’d be better than nothing so take him with you.” So I ended up in Tampa the next morning my first night in the post office. And so then that’s why I ended up substituting there for a couple of years.

INTERVIEWER: And what types of jobs did you work while on the railcars?

John Robertson: Well, I just did what you had to do in the mail car, just doing what had to be done, working parcel posts, flats, letters, whatever.

INTERVIEWER: And for any one of the jobs that you did on the railcars, could you describe a typical day for me?

John Robertson: Well, not really.  I mean, they were all about the same.  You go to work and you get lined up, you get the mail in from outside, you dumped it up in a bucket and start throwing it off here, there, and everywhere, and that’s about the story. I don’t mean to be so blunt but there isn’t much to describe what you’re doing there. You’re just going through a sack of mail and separating to where you’re heading, what part of town or what part of the state you’re going to.

INTERVIEWER: And was there any one position that you liked doing the most?

John Robertson: You mean in my career?

INTERVIEWER: As a railway post office clerk? Like, was there any one job that you just loved doing more than the others?

John Robertson: No. I just enjoyed the work.

INTERVIEWER: And did you ever dislike any of your jobs on the railway?

John Robertson: No, I was very happy with my job and what I was doing and glad to do it. That’s why I stayed with it so long.

INTERVIEWER: And what type of rail car did you work on?

John Robertson: I don’t know what you mean by that. I thought all the RPO cars were the same.

INTERVIEWER: Well, was there a specific length that you worked on the most? A lot of the former clerks have said that they worked on the 60-foot cars more often than the 30-foot cars, and we even have some people who said that they worked on the 15-foot cars for their career?

John Robertson: I could not tell you that. I don’t know. It’s not in my itinerary.

INTERVIEWER: And when you worked on the railways, do you remember what your starting salary was?

John Robertson: I have no idea what I was making.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think that the pay was fair for the amount of work that you had to do?

John Robertson: Yes. Back then we had no complaints about the salary. I’ve got $1,440 annual salary in my mind but I can’t picture what -- I think that was when I was working at the FBI in Washington when I graduated out of high school, that’s what it was. My salary then was $1,440 annual salary. But that was my first job out of high school, I was working as a clerk at the FBI in Washington, D.C. And then I went into the army, came out of the army and that’s when I had my couple of years substituting in the Railway Mail Service then.

INTERVIEWER: And what did you typically carry with you in your grip while you were on trips?

John Robertson: The least amount of whatever it took to get by. I don’t know just how much you have in mind but a candy bar or --

INTERVIEWER: I mean, this is anything that you carried in your grip.

John Robertson: In the grip? What do you mean? A parcel or a bag or something?

INTERVIEWER: A lot of the other clerks used to have, I guess like they’re little suitcases that they would take with them and a lot of times they would carry a change of clothes and their lunch, and just various items for their job.

John Robertson: I was just carrying whatever it took to get by as a meal. If I wasn’t going to go where the crew would go in to eat, then I’d have to have sandwiches or something. I would just be prepared with my sandwich and sweet roll or whatever it was like a candy bar. But that was no big deal.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever carry with you an extra change of clothes?

John Robertson: No. I didn’t have that occasion in my substituting.

INTERVIEWER: What was the longest trip you ever worked?

John Robertson: That’s too far ago. I couldn’t say. I just substituted all over the state of Florida, that’s all I know, but it was just a day trip or a night trip on the train from here to Pensacola or here to Miami or wherever.

INTERVIEWER: And do you by chance remember or know kind of like an estimate or an approximation of what your or like how long your average trip would take, how many hours?

John Robertson: No. I don’t think you could come up with any average figure like that. It was just whatever it took to -- six or eight hours of train ride was basically what they all were, I think, or something like that.

INTERVIEWER: And while you were working as railway post office clerk, did you have a family?

John Robertson: No. That was before my married days.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of your fondest memories of working on the railroads?

John Robertson: I hadn’t really given it any thought as to what memories are working on the railroad. It was just something I did to make a living and that was -- I can’t really picture that as anything much. Sorry about that.

INTERVIEWER: That’s okay.  Do you still keep in touch with any of the former clerks that you worked with?

John Robertson: No. I’m pretty much out of touch. We do have -- there's a half a dozen of us that have met every other month or so for several years and I had to turn down an invitation this past week. It was four of us who were going to meet but then I came up with a doctor’s appointment at the same time as the luncheon so I had to turn down the luncheon so there was only three of them there, but there would’ve been four of us and we were all RPO clerks back in those days, but I missed being with them the other day.

INTERVIEWER: Did the post office ever issue you anything for your safety or for your position as a railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: I have no idea.

INTERVIEWER: And were there ever times of danger while you were working on the railroad?

John Robertson: No. I don’t have any memories of any exciting event.

INTERVIEWER: But no memories of being in danger on the railway?

John Robertson: No, no.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember if you were ever put into a bad situation?

John Robertson: If I what?

INTERVIEWER: If you were ever put into a bad situation?

John Robertson: My memory doesn’t serve me that well. I don’t remember anything, though. Nothing comes to mind.

INTERVIEWER: And did you ever hear of anybody who did experience something dangerous or put into a bad situation?

John Robertson: No. I don’t have any idea of anything like that.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever face or witness any type of racial discrimination as a railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: No.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever hear of anybody who did experience racial discrimination on the railcars?

John Robertson: No, no.

INTERVIEWER: Were you a member of any type of outside organization such as a union or club that was affiliated with the railway postal clerks?

John Robertson: Well, I was a member of the union, whatever that did or whatever it was. Everybody was a member of the union but that was just part of the job, being a union member. Can’t think what the name of it was.

INTERVIEWER: And were you active with the union?

John Robertson: No. I was just one of those inactive members on the membership.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything that you ever wanted to change about your position?

John Robertson: Nope, I was satisfied with the way things were going.

INTERVIEWER: And what do you miss the most about being a railway post office clerk?

John Robertson: At my age, I don’t miss anything.  I don’t mean to be smart answered but I was happy in my job, I enjoyed my job but I have had a good retirement, I’ve enjoyed that, but I’m ready to go anytime to meet My Maker now. At 85 years old and the way the country’s going and I mean downhill that’s going, I don’t have any interest in being around with the way the country’s going, I don’t have any interest in it at all. Sorry. That’s just my attitude.

INTERVIEWER: No worries. And then for the last question, is there any other information that you would like to share with researchers about your experience or position with the railway post office? And this can be just any small tidbits that you remember.

John Robertson: No. It was just an interesting experience running back and forth all over the state and meeting people and seeing the scenery and that kind of stuff, but that was just a small part of my growing up and I was very young at that time when I was doing it. But then I went out and quit my substituting on the road and went out to the airport and worked out there, made supervisor and worked my way into being quality control officer. I had my last four years in my postal service, I was quality control officer and I enjoyed that immensely. But I went to the post master when I was 58 years old, had 40 years of government service, I went to Mr. [indiscernible] and I said, “Boss man, I’m ready to retire.” And he looked at me and said, “You’re just a young fellow, John.” I said, “Well, I’m 58 and I’ve got my 40 years government service, but the main reason is I don’t have a hunting license.” And he looked at me like, “Am I talking to an idiot or just a plain moron?” And I said, “Yes, two years I’ve been quality control officer, now for four years and that’s just two years ago they put a computer in my job,” and I said, “I had to sit there at my desk and hunt here and pick there and hunt here and pick there.” I said, “I didn’t have typing in high school so I didn’t know anything about a computer.” So I said, “I think it’s time to let somebody else do the hunting and picking and I’ll move on down the road,” and he looked at me and he said, “Well, maybe you’re right.” So that’s how I retired out of the postal service. Anyway, that’s not part of your story, is it?

INTERVIEWER: Not really but that’s okay. But what made your job such an interesting experience?

John Robertson: How’d you say that now?

INTERVIEWER: What made your position with the railway post office so interesting?

John Robertson: Other than to say I just enjoyed my work and I enjoyed the people I worked with, and that’s the whole thing. I just enjoyed doing the work, that’s the reason I stayed with it and kept working my way up. I just enjoyed the work.

Carl Robinson Interview Transcript

INTERVIEWER: Could you please state your name and affiliation with the Railway Mail Service?

Carl Robinson: My main affiliation was it?

INTERVIEWER: The position that you occupied.

Carl Robinson: Oh, I was just a clerk on the Washington-Cincinnati RPO.

INTERVIEWER: And then your full name as well.

Carl Robinson: Carl W. Robinson.

INTERVIEWER: What rail line did you work on and which location did you travel between?

Carl Robinson: Well, the one I was on most of the time was C&O from Washington to Cincinnati, the Wash & Cinn. I was on the west division from Cincinnati to Hinton, West Virginia and from time to time I ran on some other lines.

INTERVIEWER: What other lines did you run on?

Carl Robinson: I ran on the Park and Hunt HPO that is from Parkersburg, West Virginia to Huntington, West Virginia, and I ran on the Fort Wayne and Cincinnati HPO that ran from Fort Wayne, Indiana to Cincinnati. I ran on the Cincinnati to St. Louise a couple of times and I went to Chicago and Cincinnati a couple of times, and I went on N&W from Cincinnati to Bluefield, West Virginia Sound [sounds like]. I guess that’s it.

INTERVIEWER: How long did you serve as a Railway Post Office clerk? Carl Robinson: Well, about nine-and-a-half years I guess.

INTERVIEWER: Do you know which years?

Carl Robinson: Well, it would have been from 1958 and sometime in 1967, I believe it was.

INTERVIEWER: Why did you want to become a post office clerk?

Carl Robinson: Well, it sounded very interesting to me. INTERVIEWER: What part of it sounded interesting?

Carl Robinson: Well, just what it was, sorting mail on a train. It just sounded neat.

INTERVIEWER: What kind of job did you have on the railcars?

Carl Robinson: Well, I worked all of them really. I mean when I was a regular, I was mainly the register clerk for four or five years. The rest of the time I was a substitute and you just took other people’s place when they were off.

INTERVIEWER: Could you describe a typical day on the railcar?

Carl Robinson: The typical day was we worked mail on the mail car.

INTERVIEWER: I know, but for any one of the positions that you worked, just kind of walk me through a day going from when you started the task you did until you got off that night.

Carl Robinson: Well, I usually went to work a couple of hours before the train left town. You hung your pouches and sacks and you took on the mail and then you started processing the mail. Sometimes another train arrives and gives you more mail while you’re waiting. Then like this kind of weather, you’re just glad the train started moving because railcars sit in the hot sun all day and it was very hot and of course there was no air-conditioning, and we took off down the road. Sometimes when we got to Maysville, Kentucky on some occasions you get off and get your sandwich or something. You had to order in a day before though or the trip before because there wasn’t time. Then we went on down the road and stop at Portsmouth, Ashland, Huntington and each time you put out mail and or you switch on mail and you process again.

You do this all the way through and when you finished, you emptied everything you had done and pouches and sacks and hung it and move for the crew to get on in Hinton. And then they took over and you transferred your registers and everything and of course you know the mail was still on the car. They would have to put off our work individually and of course at that time you got an awful lot of newspapers.

But I guess I got off, my main time as a regular I got off at one o’clock and I got back on the train about 7 o’clock in the morning and came back and did the same thing on the way back. On the way back you have a few places where you caught the mail that was hanging on whatever you call it pole, and you threw off mail that was for them. Of course, on some trains you got a whole lot more of that than you did other trains. Mainly the trains that ran on the daytime did that.

Some of the early morning runs, like on Sunday morning, you had a lot of Sunday papers. There was so many and when you had to throw them off that you have to put a couple of sacks down on the floor and then stack the sacks of newspaper on them and then lift up the whole thing so you can get them all out in time. We couldn’t throw one at a time off you had to put them all in one time otherwise it will be all the way down the road. That’s about it I guess.

INTERVIEWER: Was there any one position that you liked doing the most?

Carl Robinson: One position?

INTERVIEWER: Yeah, was there any one position that you liked doing the most?

Carl Robinson: Well, I like the registered clerk job myself. There was a little more writing into it. It wasn’t all just sticking letters, or throwing newspapers and parcels, working on the bundles of mails and the pouches off the rack. It was a mixture so I kind of liked that more so than just standing at the case most of the way.

INTERVIEWER: Out of any of the jobs that you worked, was there anything that you every disliked?

Carl Robinson: No, not really. No, I kind of liked pretty much the whole job.

INTERVIEWER: What type of car did you work on?

Carl Robinson: Just the standard 60 foot.

INTERVIEWER: When you worked on the railways do you remember what your starting salary was?

Carl Robinson: I believe it was a $1.76.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember what your ending salary was for the railcars.

Carl Robinson: No, I can’t say to that I do. It was probably somewhere around $6,500 a year. INTERVIEWER: Do you think that the pay was fair for the amount of work that you had to do? Carl Robinson: Yes.

INTERVIEWER: What did you typically carry with you in your grip while you’re on trips?

Carl Robinson: Well, I bring my lunch and a change of clothing and the pouch labels or sack labels if I was on that type of job and my little tiny P38, my little .38 gun. That was probably it.

INTERVIEWER: What was the longest trip you ever worked?

Carl Robinson: A few times probably without counting the layover. If you count that I was gone from home approximately 48 hours, but that was because of the snow slide or something like that or a wreck; in other words, you couldn’t get back. The normal time was like, the main one I worked on most of the time I was only gone 24 hours. The other train that I worked I was gone probably 32 hours.

INTERVIEWER: While you were a Railway Post Office clerk, did you have a family?

Carl Robinson: Yes.

INTERVIEWER: How did you cope with leaving your family behind on long trips?

Carl Robinson: Well, I really didn’t think much about it to tell you the truth. I mean it was the job I had when I got married and it was pretty much accepted. I mean there was no trouble with it.

INTERVIEWER: How did your family cope while you are away on long trip?

Carl Robinson: Well, it was really not a whole different from working the night shift or something else. I mean you just happen to be gone like I said, 24 hours and then I was home for 24 hours before I went back out.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of your fondest memories of working on the railways?

Carl Robinson: The best or the worst?

INTERVIEWER: Whatever you would like to say.

Carl Robinson: Well, I know some of the worst was when we didn’t have any heat. The other one was sometimes in the middle of summer it was awfully hot because the cars were made up of nothing but steel. They had a little fan and you could put your finger in the fan to stop it. It was so slow. I don’t know how, you know -- that was like the bad times, I mean those were the bad things about it.

The good things was you were a small group and you kind have pride that you wanted to get all the mail worked up that you had. In fact, you would like to get it up of a little bit of -- you’d like to get it up ahead of time and then you could take a little nap or play a couple of hands of cards before you got off over the next stop. It was just better cooperation between people you had pride in, you’re a crew. Naturally, you were glad to get off when you got off and if you had a substitute, some worked 12 or 14 years as a substitute. If you were a regular you basically work a week on and you’re off a week. You got your 80 hours in on one week so you’re off the next week which was pretty nice. Of course, a lot of people who had families, they did a side job on the week they were off. But, again, I guess that was it. I mean I enjoyed the job. I thought it was interesting, it wasn’t so monotonous.

INTERVIEWER: Do you still keep in touch with any of the former clerks?

Carl Robinson: I keep in touch with one. There aren’t too many around. INTERVIEWER: Right.

Carl Robinson: On our particular train most of them live up in West Virginia, really, or further up in Kentucky but there wasn’t too many of them that actually lived here in Cincinnati.

INTERVIEWER: Did the post office ever issue you anything either for your safety of for the position?

Carl Robinson: Issued me anything for safety?

INTERVIEWER: Yes, or just for the job in particular.

Carl Robinson: Well, they issued me that gun. It was just a little thing. I don’t know what I would do with it if somebody was going to rob us they would have something bigger. No, I can’t say they really issued us anything.

INTERVIEWER: Were you ever in a dangerous or bad situation while on the railway?

Carl Robinson: No, I can’t say that I was. Sometimes we hit a car or something like that but it really wasn’t bad for us. I mean, it would jolt you a little bit where they made a fairly quick stop but some of the people were -- I mean there was some -- I mean not too long before my line went off, they had a big rockslide. They ended having to stay there for about a week or so until they get them out because of the slide and bring in a work crew from the railroad and they were just railroad workers. It turned the mail car like sideways on the track and it was right next to the river. I went up the other side of the river a couple of times and they were still over there. But myself, I was never in any danger.

INTERVIEWER: Are there any other stories of wrecks or bad situations that you heard about other than the rockslide?

Carl Robinson: No, not too much that I’ve heard.

INTERVIEWER: This can be anything before your time as well, like any stories that you heard of train robberies or just horrible wrecks that occurred?

Carl Robinson: The only thing I heard was a guy got up during the night then he thought the train had stopped and he thought he was getting off as normal. And I mean he stepped off the mail car and he was on a bridge, and he fell to the roadway and killed him. I mean I have no proof of it, I heard that, but I don’t know of anything. But I never heard of any robberies or anything of that nature.

I heard a story about where they brought the gold and put it on Fort Knox. They shipped it in the mail car. Of course, they shipped it that way but really they had the guards and everything from the military.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever face or witnessed any type of racial discrimination while you were a Railway Post Office clerk?

Carl Robinson: No. Basically, there was none.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever hear of anybody who experienced racial discrimination while on the rail cars?

Carl Robinson: No.

INTERVIEWER: Were you a member of any of type of outside organization such as unions or clubs that were affiliated with the railway postal clerks?

Carl Robinson: Well, we had a little union. They have their regular little meetings just like they do today. There was a union that was just for the railway mail clerks and then when they came up we just combined them with the regular -- can’t even think of their names now. They were just a regular union for all the clerks.  There’s clerk union and there is a carrier union and mail handler union. We just went into it. The guy who was in charge of it, I think he became president of an air taxi service.

INTERVIEWER: While you were a member of the union what type of things did you participate in?

Carl Robinson: I didn’t participate in too much. They had a little party once a year or whatever you call it at a park. You went and everybody got together and they had food and drinks. Then you went to a meeting and they discussed what might be a problem at that time. It was just the fact that maybe you had a hard time getting off from work because they didn’t have the help to replace you or something like that and of course we didn’t get overtime at one time.  You just got time off in place of it, but you didn’t get overtime.  Well, as a matter of fact you, just got straight pay for most of it, but if your train ran late you just got your regular time; you didn’t get overtime. The last little bit they finally got you overtime before the part is over your normal time.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything that you ever wanted to change about your position?

Carl Robinson: I can’t stay that there was anything. Like I say, I kind of liked it pretty much the way it was. It would have been nice to have air-conditioning.

INTERVIEWER: And heating.

Carl Robinson: Yeah, well, we had heat but sometimes the steam would go out and then it wouldn’t be too comfortable. We’d lay sacks on the floor to try to keep it from being so cold. The air-conditioning was the hard thing. You’re just glad to be getting moving because then you had all the doors open and you could get some air in there. When you’re sitting still in the station, there is no air and so no way of cooling the car off until you moving.

INTERVIEWER: What do you miss the most about being Railway Post Office clerk?

Carl Robinson: Well, the fact that you get your 80 hours in, in one week and get the other week off, I wish I had gotten to enjoy that more because that was kind of nice. You could do things. Well, the job that wasn’t as boring is a clerk in the post office, in the building. I guess the time off was the big thing.

INTERVIEWER: For the last question, is there any other information that you would like to make accessible to researchers about your experience or position with the Railway Post Office. This can be anything such as interesting facts or funny stories that you would like to tell?

Carl Robinson: I can’t think of anything right off but some guy wrote a little book about it.  I don’t know if you heard of that or not. It was just kind of reminiscing book. I didn’t find it all that interesting but somebody else might think it was. I heard all kinds of stories I can’t remember. There was an old story going around where somebody shipped their daughter to their grandma or something like that, sent her by mail because it was cheaper than sending her by bus or something. A few things like that but I can’t remember them off hand.

Joseph Rochelle Interview Transcript

Joseph Rochelle: My name is Joseph A. Rochelle and I was a railway mail clerk.

INTERVIEWER: And what rail lines did you work on and which locations did you travel between?

Joseph Rochelle: I traveled on the Nashville to St. Louis most of the time for 20 years plus but then also ran some to Atlanta, Georgia, Montgomery, Alabama -- I’m trying to think -- Cincinnati would be it. But most of it was Nashville to St. Louis.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And how long did you serve as a railway post office clerk?

Joseph Rochelle: Oh, now, I’d have to think about that for a minute. Twenty-five, 30 years. I was hired on as a railway mail clerk almost immediately after I was discharged from the Air Force. If it happened today, I don’t think I could have made the job, gotten the job because, while World War II was going on, if you don’t mind me telling my little story?

INTERVIEWER: No, go ahead.

Joseph Rochelle: The Railway Mail hired ladies to take, fill the vacancies that were there because we were all in the military. After I was discharged, I heard that Railway Mail was hiring men to go to work so I went down one day to the old Nashville Post Office Terminal and Railway Mail and asked them, told them I’d like to have a job. And they took my name right then and wrote it down, made a note of it or something, and said, “Come with me.” And we went over the second floor and we were crossing the hallway to the backdoor to the old terminal and went in and the man picked up the speaker, the loudspeaker and called some lady’s name and “Come over here.” And she came over and introduced me and I don’t remember her name but she was real pleasant and he told her that “This is Rochelle. He’s just discharged and here he is taking your job.” She thanked him for the work that she had. I don’t know how long she’d been there but she left and never did come back and I went right to work and I stayed there as a temporary sub but I of course soon got the regular job later.

INTERVIEWER: And you basically answered the next question, which is why did you become a railway post office clerk? Which positions did you occupy on the rail cars?

Joseph Rochelle: Basically all of them at one time, everything from clerk-in-charge all the way down to the paper clerk on the mail car.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And could you just elaborate a little bit more on that?

Joseph Rochelle: Well, let’s see. I’m thinking how to say it. When I went to work on the trains, the office was in Nashville, Tennessee and sometime in there, they changed the office to St. Louis, Missouri. And there was an old gentleman on the train who was injured off duty and they put me in his position. He was a clerk-in-charge and that put me clerk-in-charge and he never did come back to work in the Mail Service Post or Railway Mail and I stayed in his position for several years. I don’t remember how long. But after he retired, I stayed right on, stayed on the same train and stayed with them. Well, that’s about the way it was.

INTERVIEWER: And could you walk me through a typical day on the mail car?

Joseph Rochelle: Oh Lord, I will attempt it.

INTERVIEWER: Okay.

Joseph Rochelle:  It was -- well, I’ll pick one day a month that was interesting.  I was a register clerk which had to do with registered mail and we always had advance time to prepare the car for a run hanging pouches and the sacks and some when I worked in advanced mail. And one day of each month, for a long time, they bring with you the registered mail and you come down outside of the car, the railroad or the postal car, with two men with their little .38 caliber revolvers with 12 or 15 pouches of registered mail. And what it was was going to Fort Campbell, Kentucky. The payroll for the whole big base up there. Of course, I have no idea how much money was in it but they brought it down with their two armed guards and of course, I had my .38 and I’d take it up to Hopkinsville, Kentucky for a platoon, I guess it was, of military, coming down to meet the train to get their payroll and they all had their Tommy guns and they’d surround the whole area and they really took care of that but I was glad for them to sign me up on that trip with them. That was the biggest amount of money, I guess, is the way to say it and I knew what it was but that’s all I knew what it was. But anyway, it was the winter time and cold in the winter time, hot in summer time and no air condition, which we didn’t know what air conditioning was then, but I had a good time, not a fun time but a good -- working conditions were acceptable and I liked my job.

INTERVIEWER: And what position did you like the best?

Joseph Rochelle: Well, I tell there wasn’t a big difference out of any of the jobs on the train itself because the clerk-in-charge had his duties to work mail just like the paper clerks did. So they were all interesting jobs. I’m just glad I’m not expected to learn and pass the distribution that was required by all mail clerks, railway mail clerks. I couldn’t do it now. But anyway, that was a satisfying job.

INTERVIEWER: And was there anything that you ever disliked about any of the positions you worked?

Joseph Rochelle: No, I’d never say that there was. I liked all my positions. It was all on seniority and I came out and I got the seniority assignment, choose where I wanted to be or what train I wanted on and that’s what I did and I liked it. It took care of me and my family for years and years and still taking care of us. I’m not going to complain about it.

INTERVIEWER: And what type of rail car did you work on?

Joseph Rochelle: Pardon?

INTERVIEWER: What type of rail car did you work on?

Joseph Rochelle: It was just the -- let’s see -- I don’t remember -- 40-foot cars, I believe it was, the full length of them, the car. And also, I had a run from Nashville to Evansville, Indiana on a 30-foot car, half of the mail car and I liked them both. It was the smaller cars had fewer people, had fewer clerks on them. But I think we did a good job on it.

INTERVIEWER: And when you started working on the railways, do you, by chance, remember what your starting salary was?

Joseph Rochelle: Oh, I really don’t. Do you know what the start -- you would know what I started -- I’m with my daughter now. She would remember that, but that, I don’t remember what my starting salary was in railway mail. But it was enough that I wanted the job and got it and kept it.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And then because you don’t remember your starting, you’re probably not going to remember the ending salary for the railway mail service.

Joseph Rochelle: No, I don’t remember.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. But just from what you do remember of the pay, do you think that the pay was fair for the amount of work that you had to do?

Joseph Rochelle: Well, I think if I’d been too discontented I’d have looked for something else to do so I was happy with what I got. They always paid me.

INTERVIEWER: And what did you typically carry with you in your grip while you were on run?

Joseph Rochelle: Oh, of course, clean clothes and then everything pertaining to the job, a revolver, scheme, schedules, everything pertaining to it, so I don’t know how to answer that. But it was a bagful.

INTERVIEWER: And what was the longest trip you ever worked?

Joseph Rochelle: Nashville to St. Louis, Missouri. Nashville, Tennessee to St. Louis, Missouri.

INTERVIEWER: And do you remember how long it took you to get there?

Joseph Rochelle: I’d have to do some looking. All I’ll tell you on that is, all I can tell you is I have I think in my possession a schedule that I could look and see how long. It was our travel time or leaving time in Nashville and arrival time in St. Louis. But I don’t remember.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And while you were a railway post office clerk, did you have a family?

Joseph Rochelle: Yes, I did.

INTERVIEWER: And how did you cope with leaving your family behind on long trips?

Joseph Rochelle: Well, I handled it fine and my wife handled it fine and she raised three pretty good little rug rats.

INTERVIEWER: And what were some of the things that your family did while you were away on these trips?

Joseph Rochelle: Well, my wife and I always planned my time off in advance. I don’t know whether you’re familiar with the way the railway mail operated but we had our road time and so many hours of work and so much to make our whole time in this, our pay, and called road time I think it was. And they allowed us to plan our retirement -- no, not retirement -- our days off in advance and so they could always keep the assignments filled with people.

But it was a fine way to do it, in my opinion.

INTERVIEWER: And what are some of your fondest memories of working on the railroad?

Joseph Rochelle: Well, on the train, when I get in and go to work, we all knew our assignments and, the old saying we had, “every ship sits on its own bottom.” I’d go to my assignment and go to work and no one bothered me and as long as I did my job, I didn’t hear from anyone. So I was really working on -- even though there were other people on the car, I was still working individually as my own pace, and I knew how much to do or how much I had to do or how much I could do and I was just happy. That’s about the only way I know how to express that.

INTERVIEWER: That’s perfectly fine. Do you still keep in touch with any of the former clerks?

Joseph Rochelle: No, they’re disappearing fast. I haven’t talked to a former -- I really can’t remember [indiscernible]. My friends that I knew real close were -- they’ve left me. They’re just dying out quick. Let me see. On the third day of next month -- maybe not third day -- yes, third day, third of August, I’m going to turn 87 so I’m getting to be one of the last ones that’s going around that I know of. I saw a bunch of them when I was at the Railway Mail Museum but I didn’t know many of them.

INTERVIEWER: And I know that you mentioned a revolver, but was there anything else that the post office issued you for your safety or for the positions you worked?

Joseph Rochelle:  Oh yes.  We had, of course, our badge, identification badge.  Also, toward the end, they furnished us, they issued us some goggles to keep the cinders out of our eyes when we were going to the door and making an on-the-fly exchange of mail, throwing the pouch off and catching one on the go. That’s about all I could remember.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And were you ever in a dangerous situation while on the rail cars?

Joseph Rochelle: I was never on a big wreck but I was on a few times one would get derailed when the trains with the mail car would be off the tracks and go bumping on the cross ties but I didn’t consider that too dangerous. I really didn’t know enough about it, I guess. As far as being actually in danger, I’m not going to say I was ever that way at all. We were careful. We always locked our doors when we thought they had to be locked, and not just closed. But anyway, I’m not going to say I was in any kind of hold-up situation.

INTERVIEWER: And do you remember what happened when you derailed?

Joseph Rochelle: Let me see. Grab a bar up overhead and if we could get to that and grab a hold of it, your feet off of the floor of the car, we can make all those bumps easier. Our arms, I guess, would flex better.  But anyway, that’s all it was. I’m not explaining it very well but that’s about the only way I know to say it.

INTERVIEWER: And do you remember what caused the train to derail?

Joseph Rochelle: No, I don’t.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And did you ever hear of anybody experiencing a dangerous situation either on your line or perhaps another line? And this can be while you were a railway mail clerk or something that you heard before you came on.

Joseph Rochelle: I’ve heard some of the things. I was in the position where I’d talk to my brother about it, him being a postal inspector, and we would discuss some of the things that went on that he knew about on the train wrecks and [indiscernible] but I didn’t know any myself personally.

INTERVIEWER: And do you remember any of the stories behind the train wrecks?

Joseph Rochelle: There was one at Guthrie, Kentucky where it was a junction of where the Nashville-St. Louis across the tracks was one of the across Kentucky. I can’t think of the name of it. But one of the trains ran into the side of the other train up there. It’s on the junction point and they just sat for quite a while. And another one was in 1966, a freight train in Kentucky had a little crossing on I believe it was the Red River and the little cross little bridge over it failed and the freight train broke through, tore the track up and of course, put that line out of business and that’s the year that they got the trains off. I was due out on the road. I wasn’t on that day but I was due out the next day or two and I called the office about what they want me to do and they said, “Get yourself up to St. Louis and get ready to go out on your run and we’ll get you there some way.” I said, “What, you want me to -- are you going to fly me up there or what do you want me do to do?” The line was broken. There are no trains leaving St. Louis. They said, “We’ll get here the best way you can but we’re not going to fly you.”

So I got on the train and I rode for hours. Of course, I had my, I forgot what they called it, a little card, a little flashy card that’s for paying my passes on any train. I had to do that. So I went up through Louisville and I don’t know where all, and by the time I got to St. Louis, I walked into the -- got there by rail. I walked over to the mail car and I don’t know how long it took me to get there, but when I walked to the door, the chief clerk met me at the door and then I don’t remember his name now, but he told me to call him Joe. He said, “Go on back to Nashville and report to the Nashville Post Office Monday morning.” And I never did get the mail car up there at St. Louis.  I turned around, I went back, got on the train somewhere and took off, and got back to Nashville and that was the last run I ever made on a train. I reported to the Nashville Post Office and they did away with the Nashville-St. Louis in 1966.

INTERVIEWER: And did you ever face or witness any type of racial discrimination while you were a railway post office clerk?

Joseph Rochelle: Oh Lord, I’m not sure about that. I knew -- well, I will say it this way. I knew some of the African- Americans. I knew some of them really well and some of them I really liked and some I didn’t like much but it wasn’t because of discrimination. It was just because of temperament, I guess. We didn’t like some of them and they didn’t like some of us. But my overall experience with the African-Americans is quite well suited for. They made good clerks.

INTERVIEWER: Okay. And did you know of anybody who ever experienced racial discrimination while on the rail cars?

Joseph Rochelle: No, I didn’t.

INTERVIEWER: Were you a member of any type of outside organization, such as a union or club that was affiliated with the railway postal clerks?

Joseph Rochelle:  No, I wasn’t.

INTERVIEWER: And was there anything that you ever wanted to change about the position you occupied on the rail car?

Joseph Rochelle: No, I don’t think so. Anytime anything came up for jobs I would look at them and exercise my right to be in on them and accept it. If my seniority got me the job, I’d take it. If they did not just marked it off and wait for the next one. So I’m not complaining at all about it.

INTERVIEWER: And what do you miss the most about being a railway post office clerk?

Joseph Rochelle: That was long ago. I guess the time off. Six days work. When I had a run, we worked six days on and eight days off and I got my full work schedule in in that six days, hours I’m talking about, that was decided by the mail service. So that was a good part of it.

INTERVIEWER: And then for the last question, is there any other information that you would like to make accessible to researchers about your experience or the position with the railway post office? And this can be from anything, interesting facts or just funny stories.

Joseph Rochelle: Well, I was -- I’m trying to think about how to express it. My oldest son was also a postal inspector and we talked a lot about it, but I liked the way that -- and I knew two or three of the people that got caught stealing from the mail. But I think the, well how do I say this, that’s up to the attorneys, but not just fire them when they get caught stealing. They ought a had to serve some time but that’s just my opinion. I hope I haven’t been too vague on some of this stuff but I’m just trying to remember and doing the best I can telling you.

INTERVIEWER: No, you’re doing perfectly fine. Is there any other story that you would like to share?

Joseph Rochelle: Oh, I got one that’s kind of funny.

INTERVIEWER: Okay.

Joseph Rochelle: On the outskirts of one of the cities there were some people or person or something shooting at the trains, knocking windows out and so forth with some kind of a small caliber gun and we knew [indiscernible] in the newspaper. We were going through this area where it was going on and we all on the train would -- excuse me just a moment.

INTERVIEWER: Okay.

Joseph Rochelle:  We would all get below the window level and until we got clear to be sure a bullet wouldn’t come through. So I got my hand full of locks when we’re all going to get to that point. We were down below the window level and nobody looking. Everybody is just sitting there looking out the windows, I guess. We would go get in there and I pitched that handful of locks up on the pouch rack, made a good noise and scared some of them to death, and I shouldn’t have done it, I guess, but I did and I got a kick out of it. And they all laughed at it too. But that’s about the only thing. There was nothing dangerous about it, in my opinion.

INTERVIEWER: And is there anything else?

Joseph Rochelle: I don’t think so except I did, I had a good life in the mail service. The Congress passed the law one time to give us a raise. Best I remember it was 2.5 percent and the president was Harry Truman. And he got on his desk and he looked at it and said, “There’s not enough money,” and he vetoed it. And I thought [indiscernible] if that’s all we’re going to get, but he vetoed it anyway. But I never did complain about it either. I tried not to complain. But anyway, it was a good life and I’m still enjoying it.

Cortie Rolison Interview Transcript

INTERVIEWER: Could you please state your name and the position you occupied with the Railway Mail Service?

Cortie Rolison: It's Cortie Rolison, Jr. and I was a clerk and sometimes acting supervisor, clerk, acting clerk-in- charge.

INTERVIEWER: Were you ever a substitute?

Cortie Rolison: Yes. For the first I think it was a year-and-a-half or year -- yeah, first, a year-and-a-half.

INTERVIEWER: What rail line did you work on and which locations did you travel between?

Cortie Rolison: Well, the first trip was on Wheeling and Chicago and I went to Wheeling, West Virginia from Chicago. And then I run on the Chicago and Council Bluffs, which is on the Burlington Line between Chicago and Omaha. And I run on the Chicago, Fort Madison and Kansas City between Chicago and Kansas City, and Chicago and Kansas City between Chicago and Kansas City.

INTERVIEWER: How long did you serve as a Railway Post Office clerk?

Cortie Rolison: Twelve-and-a-half years.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember which years those were?

Cortie Rolison: March of '55 until August of '67.

INTERVIEWER: What got you inspired to become a Railway Post Office clerk?

Cortie Rolison: Basically, I was looking for a better job than what I had.

INTERVIEWER: What were you doing beforehand? Cortie Rolison: I worked at a wholesale hardware store.

INTERVIEWER: How did you hear about this job?

Cortie Rolison: Well, a fellow told me. He said he had signed up to take the test and I thought, well, okay, and I found out what I had to do and I signed up to take the test.

INTERVIEWER: What kinds of jobs did you have while working on the railcars?

Cortie Rolison: Well, let's see. I had a pouch rack where you dumped all the mail that come onto the trains and I had a paper case where you dumped the papers and parcels and then a letter case, and I worked registered mail and I think that's about it.

INTERVIEWER: For any one of the jobs that you had on the railcars, could you walk me through a typical day? Cortie Rolison: Well, most of the time, I worked in Chicago city. When we came to work, oh boy, in Omaha about four o'clock in the afternoon, changed clothes and then we put our headers in the case and I helped the pouch rack fellow hang his pouches and get things labeled. And then we started working letters and basically worked letters till we got to the other end of the line or we got done.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever have a layover?

Cortie Rolison: From Omaha, we’d get into Chicago about five o 'clock in the morning and go back to work about six o'clock that night, back to Omaha and get back out there about six o'clock in the morning. It will be six o'clock till four o'clock in the afternoon layover. And once in a while, the way the schedule was, I'd have a 24-hour layover and that wasn't much fun.

INTERVIEWER: Was there any one job that you liked working more than the others?

Cortie Rolison: After I had it a while, I liked working Chicago city mail the most because I got to know the streets and the city and everything and it made the distribution easier.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever dislike anything about your positions even if it was just a small complaint that you brushed off to the side?

Cortie Rolison: Well, the biggest thing I disliked was how hot the mail cars were in the summertime. But other than that, I enjoyed what I was doing most all the time.

INTERVIEWER: What type of railcar did you work on?

Cortie Rolison: Well, one of the trains, we had a 30-foot car for working mail which is half a car that's westbound. And eastbound we had two 60-foot and a 30-foot car and they had the boxes, the pouch racks and everything just like in a regular post office.

INTERVIEWER: When you worked on the railways, do you remember what your starting salary was? Cortie Rolison: When I started, it was $1.71 and 1/2 an hour. That was in 1955.

INTERVIEWER: And then in 1967 when you stopped working on the railways, do you remember what your salary was then?

Cortie Rolison: I don’t know exactly but somewhere around $8,000 to $9,000 a year.

INTERVIEWER: Do you believe that the pay was fair for the amount of work that you had to do?

Cortie Rolison: I believe the pay was fair because it was pretty much in line with all of our friends and everything so, yeah, I thought it was fair.

INTERVIEWER: How did that compare when you were working at the warehouse?

Cortie Rolison: Well, when I worked at the warehouse, when I left there in 1955, my salary, my pay was $1.11 an hour but we worked 60 to 65 hours a week. And I went to work at the post office for $1.71 so it was a big jump.

INTERVIEWER: What did you typically carry with you in your grip while you were on runs?

Cortie Rolison: Well, I had work clothes and street clothes. I carried, well, a shave kit and such and in my big grip, I had my schemes, schedules, labels and facing slips for the letter cases and pouch racks and things, and a cup to drink out of. I guess that's about it.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember what the longest trip you ever worked was?

Cortie Rolison: There was a washout on the railroad and we detoured and I went to work at four o'clock in the afternoon and I got to Omaha via the detour and everything about three o'clock the next afternoon just in time to go buy groceries and food to get on the train to go back to Chicago. For about a week, I was on the train just about all the time.  But normal runs were about 12 to 13 hours and we’d go to work at four o'clock in Chicago and get into Omaha between four and five o'clock so --

INTERVIEWER: While you were working as a Railway Post Office clerk, did you have a family?

Cortie Rolison: Oh yeah. My two oldest children were, I think, two and four when I started and I had a daughter born later and so I had three kids so, yeah, the whole time.

INTERVIEWER: How did you cope with leaving your family behind on long trips?

Cortie Rolison: I just knew I had to go to work and I told them goodbye, I'll see you in about a week. And I was gone for six or seven days and then I came home and I was home for a week so it all balanced out. The kids thought they were lucky to have me around part of the time.

INTERVIEWER: What was your family's attitude towards your job?

Cortie Rolison: Well, they just knew that that's what dad did and my wife knew that it was paying us, well, we figured pretty well and so it was just a thing that we had to do.

INTERVIEWER: What were some of the activities they did to keep themselves busy while you were gone?

Cortie Rolison: Oh, just normal everyday kid things and wife kept the house and sewed a lot. And I think they went to church and the kids had church activities so just ordinary everyday stuff.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of your fondest memories of working on the railways?

Cortie Rolison: Oh boy. Well, a lot of it was we worked together and had a lot of camaraderie and a lot of times that when we got to Chicago at four in the morning, we just laid down to take a nap and we'd go to a Cubs or White Sox ballgame in the afternoon and get back before we went to work. It was just the camaraderie with the guys that I worked with.

INTERVIEWER: Do you still keep in touch with any of the former clerks?

Cortie Rolison: Oh yeah. The clerks that ran on the Chicago and Council Bluffs, two years after the mail trains came off, we started having a yearly reunion about the first of May. And it went from a big reunion to over a period of time, I think this last year we had about 18 or 20 people all that was there. But we're all getting old and we have no place to go to get new members.

INTERVIEWER: Okay, all right. Did the post office ever issue you anything either for your safety or for the position?

Cortie Rolison: Well, most all of the stuff that we had to have we bought ourselves, except they issued us a .38 pistol and they did after a little while gave us firearms training. So it wasn't much other than what I already knew but I carried a .38 all the time when I was at work.

INTERVIEWER: Did they ever provide any type of supplies for your job?

Cortie Rolison: Just the facing labels and the pouch and paper sack labels and other than that, everything we needed, we bought ourselves.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever experience any type of dangerous or bad situation on the railway?

Cortie Rolison: No, not really. One night, I was doing nonstop local and a sack kind of wrapped around my foot and I had to kick it a couple of times to get rid of it but if you did follow the rules and regulations, you did pretty good.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever hear any of the other clerks telling stories about anything bad or dangerous that may have happened to them or even if it was during your time or perhaps some time before you came onto the job?

Cortie Rolison: Well, I did nonstop local on the train westbound at night and I told my wife, no, it's not dangerous. But anyhow, we had a friend who knew a male clerk from Ottumwa and we were talking with him one day and he said this fellow had fallen out of the train and got killed. And I did tell my wife it wasn't a dangerous job, but there were dangers if you didn’t follow the rules and regulations.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever hear of any bad train accidents?

Cortie Rolison: Yeah. Well, not too much with mail trains but I did see a freight train had derailed some cars and some things like that. We read about them but I didn’t think too much about them because it wasn't going to happen to you. And I was never in an accident. I was on the train a couple of different times when we hit cars but nothing serious happened from it.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever face or witness any type of racial discrimination on the railcars?

Cortie Rolison: Not really because we worked together. Well, I had people I liked and I didn't really like too well. And the ones I didn't like too well I didn't have much to do with them away from the mail car and one of the colored guys said to me, “You're discriminating against me.” He said, “You don’t invite me to go eat with you.” And I said well, I don't care for your attitude and things that you do and so I said if you're white or colored or whatever, with that attitude, I wouldn’t have anything to do with you. But pretty much, we were in tight quarters and you pretty much just worked with everybody and accepted them for who they were.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever hear stories of any of the other clerks who may have faced or witnessed racial discrimination?

Cortie Rolison: No. Some didn't really talk about it.

INTERVIEWER: Were you ever a member of any type of outside organization such as a union or club that was affiliated with the railway postal clerks?

Cortie Rolison: I belonged to the NPTA, National Postal Transport Association, which was a lobbying group early on and we hired lobbyists to lobby Congress for pay raises and things like that. And then when they changed it from the U.S. Post Office Department to the U.S. Postal Service, it became more like a union and negotiated contracts with the Post Office for the clerks. And then I later on belonged to the National Association of Postal Supervisors, the same thing.

INTERVIEWER: And what did that -- same thing?

Cortie Rolison: Well, the National Association of Postal Supervisors, it was back to where all they could do was lobby for pay raises and everything. Well, that was in the Post Office. We had no bargaining rights. We just had to lobby and see what we could get.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything that you ever wanted to change about your position?

Cortie Rolison:  No, not really.  Well, once in a while they'd give us a state way off someplace to study and I thought I'd like to change that because I don't think I'll ever use it, but you studied what they said and went with it. My attitude was to take what you've got and you make the best of it. So not too much I want to change.

INTERVIEWER: What do you miss the most about being a Railway Post Office clerk?

Cortie Rolison: Being younger. No, what I missed the most when I got bounced off the train was the time off because I went from working six days and having seven days off and six days and having nine days off to working five days a week. And it's amazing how much you could do with all the time off.

INTERVIEWER: Is there anything else that you miss?

Cortie Rolison: Oh, a lot of the guys that I didn’t see anymore or see maybe once a year. I miss a lot of the people that way but no, because I just went in Ottumwa Post Office, accepted it, that's where I was going to have to be and that was that.

INTERVIEWER: For the last question, is there any other information that you would like to share with researchers about your experience or position with the Railway Post Office? This can be anything from interesting sites that you may have seen on the road or funny stories that you might have.

Cortie Rolison: Oh boy. Well, most of them are kind of bare -- I never saw any fights, a lot of joking and kidding amongst people and everything. You probably can’t print this but I was walking up the street with a bunch of young fellows one day and he said, look coming down the street. There was a mother and a daughter and they said, look at that young one. I looked down and I said the mother doesn't look too bad and everybody just laughed, but just little things like that was, you know, you don’t think about it much but just like I said a lot of being together with guys and enjoying life as best as you could.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever see anything weird or odd come through the mail?

Cortie Rolison: Well, not on the trains. The worst thing we would get would be live chickens, baby chicks and you had them chirp-chirp-chirping and we had to keep them in the car where it was warm and we'd get down the roadway and put them off. But most everything that came through was either wrapped up or in boxes and things. Well, one time, I was making that extra trip on -- well, I was sent along to Santa Fe to Kansas City and coming home, they said to me, said you’re going over to Union Station, aren’t you? And I said, yeah. And they said we'll make you a registered clerk convoy and I said okay because it was a little extra pay.

Well, we got into Chicago and I walked over to the door and a transfer clerk got on and said, where is this MSCA [sounds like], which was a different kind of a pile for registers and I said laying there, I said pick it up and don’t lay it down. He said you will get out with that in your hand? I said I got to carry my grip. He said we'll put them on the cart which is they didn’t usually do. So I’m walking up through the Santa Fe station with four guards, two ahead of me with shotguns and two behind me with rifles. And I thought oh, boy. Well, we went out and we got into a mail truck to go to the main post office and the mail truck was an armored car. It looked just like a mail truck on the outside but it wasn't.

And I got over there and I asked the register clerk. I said what in the world is this thing? He said you have about $2.5 million in bearer bonds. He said if anybody gets them, anybody could cash them. And I thought, well, I wish I had known that. I told him I wouldn’t be the registered convoy but we got over there all right. But that was one of the things I wondered what was going on and it's kind of a little scary.

Edward Rountree Interview Transcript

Edward Rountree: My name is Edward A. Rountree. I was a railway mail clerk out of Jacksonville, Florida. I ran on Ocala and St. Pete RPO most of my career.

INTERVIEWER: And were you a regular or a sub?

Edward Rountree: I was a regular clerk. Well, I was a regular clerk. I was in the service 18 years. Thirteen of them were regular clerk and I subbed for five and a half years.

INTERVIEWER: And could you repeat the rail lines that you worked on and the locations that you traveled between?

Edward Rountree: Well, they were numerous. As I said earlier, I was a substitute clerk by choice for five years and I ran on all of the runs out of Jacksonville, Florida, Jack and Pensacola, Jack and St. Pete, Jack, Ocala, and St. Pete, Jack and Miami, and I ran north on Hamlet and Jack and I ran north on Florence and Jack at one time or another.

INTERVIEWER: And I know that you said that you served as a railway post office clerk for 18 years. Do you remember which years you served?

Edward Rountree: 1949 until we quit sorting mail in I think it was ’66. I’m not positive of the exact dates but I entered the Railway Mail Service I believe in 1949.

INTERVIEWER: And what made you want to become a post office clerk?

Edward Rountree: My older brother had heard about it and he was on the Naval Reserve Crew with two railway mail clerks and he came home and said, “We need to take that exam.” And so he talked me into taking the exam and at the time, I had no interest in it whatsoever but it sounded pretty neat and then after seeing he made a better grade and he went in before I did and I went down to visit in what they call advance time and it seemed like a real nice job so I decided that -- I was an apprentice machinist at the time.

INTERVIEWER: And what types of jobs did you have while on the rail cars?

Edward Rountree: I was what we called a letter clerk and a paper clerk and a local clerk. These are different jobs that you had inside the car. I really ran every job there was because I was an experienced substitute clerk so I even took the place of the foreman or what we called a clerk-in-charge.

INTERVIEWER: And for any one of the positions that you had, could you describe a typical day on the rail car, starting from when you first went into work?

Edward Rountree: Well, my tour usually started on the day train.  You get up quite early in the morning.  We went to work probably 5:30, six o’clock in the morning and we worked approximately three hours before the train ever left. We call that advance time. And then when our train came into the station, they would switch the other car out, put ours in, and then the day train, it only took about six hours to get to Tampa and my job most of the time was the local clerk. I worked the newspapers. I did all the loading and then separate the newspapers and I handled all local exchanges. By that, I mean putting the mail off and taking it on and making sure that the other clerks had what they needed to do to their job.

And then I would sleep for about six or seven hours in Tampa and I came back on the night train and the night train was a much slower train and it took most of the night and we also had advance time there and we stopped at every place to pick up parcel post and that sort of thing. So it would be a 10-11-hour day. Then I slept all day at home in Jacksonville, went back to work that night on the southbound night train, which I have said before is a very slow train because it stopped everywhere, and then I had five or six hours sleep at the other end and then finished up on the day train. It took me three days to make two round trips and before that, I would then have three to five days off after that.

INTERVIEWER: And was there any one job that you liked doing the most on the rail car?

Edward Rountree: Oh, I don’t think there is any particular one job. I liked the excitement of being the local clerk, the one that put the mail off and took the mail on and we made our catcher exchanges and the day just seemed to fly by. You were at the other end of the line before you knew it. Night train stopping everywhere, it was more boring. It was like working at a post office almost. So I would say my favorite job was local on the day train.

INTERVIEWER: And was there anything that you ever disliked about any of the jobs or the positions that you held?

Edward Rountree: Well, like I said before, working on the night train, for instance, my job southbound was to distribute the Tampa City mail so that when we got to Tampa, the mail and all the business mail was ready to be delivered right that minute because we had already separated it. And it was certainly exciting to make sure you got through before you got to the other end. But by the same token, you are in the same spot working the same case all night long and that was a little bit boring but it was still a wonderful job.

INTERVIEWER: What type of rail car did you typically work on?

Edward Rountree: Typically, a 30-foot apartment car, they called it. And I also worked as a substitute on all sizes, a 15-foot car, a 30-foot car, and a 60-foot car. But my regular job was in a 30-foot car.

INTERVIEWER: And when you worked on the railways, do you remember what your starting salary was?

Edward Rountree: No. No, I don’t. A substitute clerk worked by the hour and our check varied according to how many hours we worked. Because we had no prescribed number of hours to work, the ruling at that time was they did not have to pay overtime for 40 hours. Therefore, in the wintertime, when the mail tripled in Florida, we would work it seemed like almost twice the time and the substitute clerks, they did not have to pay them time and a half. But we were all young and had young families and we wanted to work as many hours that they let us. So I had no set number of hours and I do not remember the hourly rate but it was -- I was well compensated, I think.

INTERVIEWER: And so that basically answers my next question, if you thought that the pay was fair for the amount of work that you had to do.

Edward Rountree: Yes, I did.

INTERVIEWER: What did you typically carry with you in your grip while you were on trips?

Edward Rountree: Well, we were -- we had to carry our revolver and our badge and our scheme and schedule and a copy of the postal laws and regulations. And then in my case, just a change of clothes is all I would have in mine and I tried to make it as light and my lunch.

INTERVIEWER: And do you remember the longest trip you ever worked?

Edward Rountree: No. It would be because of a train accident that somewhere along the line, once in a while, we would meet, say, a freight train got derailed or something like that and they would have to -- and then of course, working in Florida, other than hurricanes, and I do not remember any particular run that I was on that was affected by hurricanes but we had them but I cannot tell you which one was the longest or anything like that, no.

INTERVIEWER: And while you were working as a railway post office clerk, did you have a family?

Edward Rountree: Oh yes, yes.

INTERVIEWER: And how did you cope with leaving your family behind on long trips?

Edward Rountree: Well, it’s just that you did it everyday of your life just about and it was a very normal and natural thing to do. I don’t remember any crises. That was fortunate, I guess, but I don’t remember any crisis and it was like going to work with any other job. It was kind of different to begin with, of course, because you don’t spend that much time away from home when you’re that young. I was probably 22 years old when I started so a young family and just glad to have a good job.

INTERVIEWER: And how did your family cope when you were away?

Edward Rountree: Oh, again, I don’t want to sound repetitive but I can’t remember when we first started but it got to be so natural that I had my calendar marked. That was one advantage of being a railway mail clerk. You can mark up your calendar at the beginning of the year because my job was a six-week cycle and every six weeks, I had nine days off because you built up so many hours while you’re on the road. I would have nine days off.

And to a lot of people, that’s a vacation and so my family knew when I was going to be in town and knew, they knew as much as I did almost because my calendar was marked at the beginning of the year and so there wasn’t much coping to do with it. We all just -- and of course, I must say like most railway mail clerks, I had -- you just don’t sit around the house and do nothing so I had what we called a moonlight job and I learned to be a television photographer in my off time and I utilized that good layoff to earn extra money and I think most railway mail clerks did. So I was busy all the time and loved it.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of your fondest memories of working on the railroad?

Edward Rountree: The camaraderie, I would say. I was in the post office a total of 38 years and like I said, after my railway mail clerk days, I became an audio-visual specialist at postal headquarters in postal service training management, and I had experience to see all forms of the post office and I will always say that you’ll never find the esprit de corps that we had in the Railway Mail Service. It was -- you took so much pride in getting the job done before you got to the other end of the line that I’ve always said I’ve been very proud and happy that I was a railway mail clerk.

INTERVIEWER: And could you elaborate a little bit more when you said that you saw all forms of the post office? Edward Rountree: When I was doing audio-visual production, we made training films for the letter clerks, for the supervisors, even the vehicle maintenance people. I helped make training films, took still pictures from manuals and all of that, so I was privileged to go into the different post offices all over the country producing training films. And then quite frankly, I saw a lot of things that would never have been tolerated in a railway mail car, I mean the way that people weren’t as industrious as we were, let me put it that way.

INTERVIEWER: And do you still keep in touch with any of the former clerks?

Edward Rountree: No. They’re about all gone now and I was privileged to come to the reunion that the Smithsonian had last year and I’ve acquired more friends from that than I -- in fact, if you -- I cannot contact anybody in my hometown that was a railway mail clerk because I’ve lost track of all of them. But I must say that my -- the last 18 years being up in the Washington D.C. area took me away and I lost track of them while I was up there because I worked up there 18 years.

INTERVIEWER: Did the post office ever issue you anything for your safety or for your job?

Edward Rountree: Well, we had goggles. I forgot that. That’s another thing I had in my suitcase and a revolver would be safety. That was to defend the mail. I won’t say it was for our safety but I guess if you stretch the point, then it would be. And of course, we were required to wear our goggles when we were making the catcher exchange because a lot of things could get in your eyes.

INTERVIEWER: Were you ever in a dangerous or bad situation while on the railway?

Edward Rountree: No. Well, anything can happen when you’re doing 80 miles an hour down the road. Well, we didn’t do 80 probably but no, I was fortunate. I’ve heard tales of other clerks. The train they were on was in a bad accident and things like that. But if I did it was maybe the train would hit a car on the tracks or something like that but I wouldn’t consider it really dangerous but the work itself, anything can happen, like when you’re driving an automobile, anything can happen. But I was very fortunate in my 18 years not to be in an accident.

INTERVIEWER: And you kind of led into my next question. Did you ever hear of anybody experiencing anything dangerous on your line or on another line?

Edward Rountree: Well, yes, you would always hear the other clerks telling about hitting an automobile and glad the train didn’t turn over and things like that. And then of course, some of my fellow clerks, some of the old- timers that I ran with, I’ve heard of it, yes. But as far as turning over, having them hit the car or something like that and turning over, some of them were quite injured but that would be the old-timers more than my age.

INTERVIEWER: And was there any particular story that stands out to you about that?

Edward Rountree: Well, I think probably my own experience as a substitute for the first time I ever had to run, we had a few one-man runs where you run. The mail car is only 15-foot long. We had usually what we referred to as a branch line run from Lakeland, Florida to Clewiston, Florida and Clewiston, Florida is on the Lake Okeechobee and out in the middle of nowhere, sugarcane fields all around, and I was the only clerk and US Sugar Corporation was in -- you had the payroll for that thing and of course, as a 22-year-old, that was my very first run and I was scared to death that I’d mess up and nobody to ask and I often thought what if somebody did get in that mail car and demand the payroll and on that same run?

One of the funniest things that ever happened, as you probably know, we had mail slots in the railway mail car and many, many people at the small stations would come down the train to mail their letters and we had a postmark. Most of them would just hand it to you instead of putting in the slot and when I was in a little tiny town, I’ll tell you, it was more Moore Haven, Florida on Lake Okeechobee, the person give me a handful, and I was canceling them and somebody had put a nickel, the nickel with a paperclip in the corner. And there was another I think we were required. The clerk in charge were required to carry stamps to sell to the public in case they needed it. And here, I was canceling these letters and there was a nickel and that was the price of a stamp in those days. And I said, “Gee whiz,” and fortunately, as a young substitute, I did have a staff to put on there and I put the nickel on my pocket.

INTERVIEWER: And as far as you hearing other clerks, especially the old-timers talk about train wrecks, do you remember any of the stories that they told you?

Edward Rountree: You know, when you get 84 years old, those are the kind of things that you -- I can’t tell you the details. There was one particular fella up in South Carolina and he walked with a considerable limp. He was really injured quite bad but he still wanted to work. He didn’t want a disability. And at one time, I can tell you about that train wreck but after all these other years now, I can honestly say I remember the train wreck that he was in.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever face or witness any type of racial discrimination while you were working as railway post office clerk?

Edward Rountree: No, none, none. And one of the best foremen I ever had was a black fella and then no, I don’t remember it at all. No discrimination.

INTERVIEWER: And did you hear of anybody who did experience it?

Edward Rountree: Honestly, I don’t think so, no. No, I don’t.

INTERVIEWER: Were you ever a member of any type of outside organization, such as a union or club that was affiliated with the railway postal clerks?

Edward Rountree: Oh yes, we had our -- what did we call it -- we had a railway mail clerk association, yes. We had a union and it was strictly fraternal because as you probably know, it’s against the law to strike against the government were, I remember, strictly fraternal. Yes, I think everybody just about belonged to it.

INTERVIEWER: And what were some of the things that you guys did?

Edward Rountree: Oh, we made recommendations, nitpicking stuff that would make it better. We young clerks wanted to air condition the mail cars but the old-timers said, “Shoot, no, we don’t want that. All that hot air coming in and cool, we’ll catch a cold.” So the old-timers, they didn’t want anything to do with the air condition but the young clerks did but that was one of the little nitpicking things that the -- it was, like I say, it was just a gathering and anytime you get two railway mail clerks together, they can talk and talk and talk and so we just talked about our runs and how much mail we had and all that kind of stuff because it varied. Sometimes, you’d have an easy trip and sometimes, many, many times, I have gone to one end of the line to the other and not even stopping to eat lunch because of your pride. You didn’t want your fellow clerks to know you couldn’t get it done.

INTERVIEWER: Were you ever featured in any type of publication for your organization?

Edward Rountree: I don’t think so. No. No, I became, like I said earlier, a news camera person and when the last railway mail run out of Jacksonville, Florida made a nice news film out of it in our local station, the NBC station, and the news director ran, oh about five minutes of it, by the way, which I sent a copy to the Smithsonian so it was about a five-minute news item and I did those sort of things. If there was any award for anything like that, I would take pictures of it but no major, major big deal.

INTERVIEWER: And was there anything that you ever wanted to change about your job and if so, what was it and why?

Edward Rountree: No, like I said earlier, I thoroughly enjoyed being a railway mail clerk and I probably fussed about some things but right now, I can’t think of it, no.

INTERVIEWER: What do you miss the most about being a railway post office clerk?

Edward Rountree: Well, the biggest adjustment when we quit sorting mail on the train was the layoff, the time off that we all had. Those who didn’t retire had to go into the post office in some way or another and I was fortunate because I went in to the public relations. I became a customer service representative because of my television experience. But most of the clerks everywhere, I would see my fellow clerks around the post office as part of my public relations job and too, every one of them missed the layoff. We were used to condensing our hours and having three or four days off at a time. But then the post office, you worked a regular five-day week, at eight in the morning until five in the afternoon-type thing, you know, and so no, it was layoff, without a doubt.

INTERVIEWER: And is there anything else that you miss about your position?

Edward Rountree: The camaraderie. I enjoyed seeing my fellas and we’d always wave to the other crews when you met the train and just the camaraderie, that’s what I miss the most.

INTERVIEWER: And for the last question, is there any other information or stories that you would like to make accessible to researchers about your experience or position with the railway post office?

Edward Rountree: Not necessarily. No. It was a good run and I’m just glad that I was part of it.

Jack Ruben Interview Transcript

Jack Ruben: My name is Jack Ruben and I was employed by the U.S. Postal Service in the transportation division of the postal -- dealt with transportation of mail between facilities.

INTERVIEWER: And were you a regular or a substitute clerk?

Jack Ruben: Substitute for 14 years and was promoted to supervisor from substitute.

INTERVIEWER: What rail lines did you work on and which locations did you travel between?

Jack Ruben: I traveled between New York and Buffalo on the New York and Chic line. I worked in New York and Pitt and I worked on the Boston and New York as a substitute. In other words, I was assigned to terminals but whenever the substitute pool for any one of the lines was exhausted, they would come to the substitute pool at the terminal and that’s when I went on.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of those cities that you traveled between?

Jack Ruben: New York and Buffalo, New York; New York and Pittsburg.

INTERVIEWER: What are some other stops in between? You don’t have to name them all, just some of them. Jack Ruben: In New York, between New York and Buffalo, we went to Poughkeepsie, Albany, Utica, Syracuse and Rochester. Those are the big cities. On the New York and Pitt, we had out of New York we had Newark, New Jersey, North Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Harrisburg, and there’s one more that don’t come to mind and then Pittsburg of course. On the Boston-New York, Boston, there was New Haven, Bridgeport and I don’t recall any other places there.

INTERVIEWER: How long did you serve as a Railway Post Office clerk?

Jack Ruben: As a railway post, well, that would be a difficult number to come up with because in the 14 years I was in AMS I was all over. I guess about six to seven years, I’m guessing now. I’d have to look at my form 50s.

INTERVIEWER: Do you by chance remember which years you served as an RPO clerk?

Jack Ruben: I’d have to look that up.

INTERVIEWER: What got you started as a Railway Post Office clerk? What served as your inspiration?

Jack Ruben: Inspiration?  To have a job and initially I went to the post office to have a job and I was thinking I would only work there for a while and find something else but the longer you stay, the longer you have invested so I stayed longer. It was a job and I could earn a living that’s why I stayed. It was mostly money. Nothing romantic, I’m sorry.

INTERVIEWER: Oh, it’s okay. What types of jobs did you have on the railcar?

Jack Ruben: Whatever they assigned me. I can’t say I had a specific job. No matter whom I was covering, I would pick up their supplies at the beginning of the trip and whatever position they had. If this foreman thought I can handle it, he would let me work that job; otherwise, I worked whatever he asked me to do.

INTERVIEWER: What was that?

Jack Ruben: Loading mail into the car, unloading mail, distribution, working the racks. I worked every position that they had over the years. I didn’t have one position. I had really no – I covered whoever was off. The registered mail, I handled registered mail. Whatever the supervisor said I should be doing.

INTERVIEWER: For any one position, could you describe a typical day on the railcars starting from when you first went in to work until you would finish with the run?

Jack Ruben: A typical, well, number one I was notified to go on the road on very short notice. It could be a few hours. If I’m working in a terminal and they need someone to go out, I was supposed to be ready to go. They didn’t really force you but they made it hard to say no. So I had to be ready, you know, a phone call maybe I’d have two hours notice to get into the city and get on the train. When I got there, I’d get into the car. In the beginning, when I was new it was a quite a learning experience. I knew I had to bring lunch along so I brought lunch along and put it in the icebox and after we started work, a lot of mail came into the car and there was mail all over the place and when it was time to eat lunch, my lunch was buried in the icebox. I learned after that not to put it in the icebox.

After that, wherever I’m assigned I did my job and when we got to the end, I followed the crew to wherever we were sleeping that night. Usually, it was a hotel or some place they lined up and go to sleep, get up and get back to work, worked on the way back. I usually worked a lot on weekends because that’s when most of the regulars for some reason couldn’t make it. So I worked weekends. I’d be working at the terminal and then on the weekends I’d usually be out on the road.

INTERVIEWER: Was there any one position that you liked working more than the others?

Jack Ruben: No, I worked whatever I was assigned to do. I found it helped me later on when I became a supervisor because I was familiar with almost all positions and whatever job was at hand. It’s just an attitude when you come to work, you do your best when you get there, and usually I got some positive comments from supervisors.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything that you ever disliked about your job and this can be just something small that you may have brushed off to the side?

Jack Ruben: I guess the hours, the working nights was not my favorite thing. That was tough to get it used to but once I had enough seniority to make day tour, I really didn’t -- it’s just again you came in to make a living and to do a job. There was a good attitude about doing – one supervisor had it this way. We all had to take schemes and space testing annually and he felt that we were always questioning the reason why we had to do it. He said, you know, we found that the people who cared enough to take the exams every year were the ones who were more interested in doing a good job and I happen to agree with him.

INTERVIEWER: What type of railcar did you work on?

Jack Ruben: Mostly the 60-footers.

INTERVIEWER: When you work on the railways, do you remember what you’re starting salary was?

Jack Ruben: One minute, that I have here somewhere. Where did I put that? Here it is. I have my form 50 here. That’s a personnel action form and going to the beginning, $2.00. No, not $2.00, I’m sorry, $1.715 an hour.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember what your ending salary was when you were working on the railways?

Jack Ruben: When I was working on the railways? Let’s see if I can find it. That’s when I was supervisor, foreman, no, clerk-in-charge, here we are. I ended at January ‘62, the highest rate I had was - I had a number of rates -

$2.76.

INTERVIEWER: Do you believe that the pay was fair for the amount of work that you had to do?

Jack Ruben: Oh sure.

INTERVIEWER: Why do you believe that it was fair?

Jack Ruben: As I recall, it was the best I could get at that time.

INTERVIEWER: What did you typically carry with you in your grip while you were on trips?

Jack Ruben: I had my badge. I’m sure if I had to carry a gun, I had a gun permit, a ring knife. What else would I carry with me? Just a change of clothing, underwear and socks so I could change for the return trip, a change of underwear and shirt, all that stuff. That’s what I had ready. I had a little bag packed because I never knew when I was going out, so I prepared something in advance and I think I had what I just mentioned, the underwear, shirt and a little paraphernalia. Because, when I was covering somebody, the regular clerk-in-charge or had that job, he prepared the labels and facing slips that were required as part of the job and they were available for me when I arrived at the station. I didn’t have to do that advance work.

INTERVIEWER:  What was the longest trip you ever worked?

Jack Ruben: The longest, I would say the New York and Chic trains from New York to Buffalo. No, I’ll take that back, New York and Pitt. New York and Pitt was the longest.

INTERVIEWER: How long did that take you to get there?

Jack Ruben: I don’t really recall but it took a long time and they were the heaviest mail line. The heaviest line, they were hit at every station.

INTERVIEWER: While you were working as a Railway Post Office clerk, did you have a family? Jack Ruben: Oh yes. I wouldn’t work unless I had a family. I was born with a family.

INTERVIEWER: How did you cope with leaving your family behind on long trips?

Jack Ruben: Well, naturally, my wife didn’t like it all. We hated the hours especially working at night. We all hated that.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of the things that your family did while you were away? How did they keep themselves occupied?

Jack Ruben: It was a growing family. I had two sons and my wife was busy taking care of them and they went to school and did all the things that you have to do. Again, I remember, most of the time I worked I wasn’t gone like a regular was who was gone for like a week at a time. I was gone just for the weekend. So I wasn’t away that, as disruptive as a regular man assigned or the regular substitute pool. I really, primarily covered weekend work but sometimes during the week but most of the time it was weekends. They had a substitute pool for each line and then they had the -- we were a fall-back. I was in the fall-back position.

INTERVIEWER: What are some of your fondest memories of working on the railroads?

Jack Ruben: The camaraderie and there was a feeling there that we’re all in here to do the job and we all took pride in getting the job done. I found over the years as I became a supervisor and saw other new people coming in, the requirements were reduced. We didn’t have the same desire to please especially in the big city terminals. If you went away from the big cities, people had more pride in their work. When you got to the big terminals, it seemed to disappear. As soon as they came out of the big facilities, the bulk mail facilities and things like that, the attitude toward work was negative.

INTERVIEWER: Did the post office ever issue you anything either for your safety or for your position?

Jack Ruben: Issue me for my safety? No, other than training, courses and stuff, I got, how to shoot a gun, how to handle firearm training. Other than that for safety, nothing; everything else we have to buy ourselves. Scheme cards if we took a test, we took them all. We had to get our own cards and prepare them and test ourselves.

INTERVIEWER: Were there ever times of danger while on the railway? Did you ever experience a bad or dangerous situation?

Jack Ruben: Well, there was always the element of danger in getting in and out of the cars especially in bad weather. You had to be very careful. Some people did get hurt falling down and you worked at lousy hours, bad lighting conditions and lights weren’t always on and it was sometimes pretty cold. They didn’t prepare the cars properly. But luckily, other than straining my back, probably, which I still have a problem with; I didn’t get hurt too badly. I’m sure I banged myself up a couple of times but nothing really bad happened to me. I’ve known others who did get hurt badly.

INTERVIEWER: So you were never involved in a wreck of any type?

Jack Ruben: No.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever hear stories from any of the other clerks who may have been involved in a wreck or some type of bad situation?

Jack Ruben: Not that I can recall. Not that I can recall.

INTERVIEWER: Did you ever face or witness any type of racial discrimination as a Railway Post Office clerk?

Jack Ruben: Not that I can recall. Once you were working with people, it was just work. We all worked together.

INTERVIEWER: Did you hear stories of other clerks who may have experienced racial discrimination?

Jack Ruben: Not that I can recall. I’m Jewish and I’ve had some remarks made about me but other than that, I don’t recall a racial incident at all.

INTERVIEWER: Were these remarks malicious in any way?

Jack Ruben: Well, they were euphemisms like “you people” or, you know, they were discriminatory remarks so they referred to foods that you’re eating or things like that. There was no missing someone who was anti-Semitic. They let you know it and you dealt with it, that’s all. It wasn’t unusual, just dealt with it in the Army or anywhere else. That’s part of living.

INTERVIEWER: Were you a member of any type of outside organization such as a union or club that was affiliated with railway postal clerks?

Jack Ruben: Yes, they had an American Legion Post when I was working at an Air Mail Facility. Not on the road.

On the road, they didn’t have one. They had one at an Air Mail Facility. It was American Legion Post, which was a railway or high -- it was a transportation thing but not an RPO. I belonged [audio glitch] awhile when I was there as a substitute.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything that you ever wanted to change about your position no matter big or small? Jack Ruben: Oh yeah, I always wanted to move up. Once I decided - I can’t tell you exactly when it happened - I realized that this was going to be where I was going to stay, I wanted to move ahead and I did. I moved up to transportation officer level 25, and I left.

INTERVIEWER: Was there anything else that you wanted to change?

Jack Ruben: No, I just wanted -- I was looking to change and improve things, which I did. I managed to do a few things while I was working in transportation, not in the RPO area because I didn’t have any clout at that time. I was just a sub but when I moved up and became an officer, I certainly made some recommendations to make changes.

INTERVIEWER: What do you miss the most about being a Railway Post Office clerk?

Jack Ruben: I can’t say I miss it because that’s 30 years ago or more, about 50 years ago. It was a – I enjoyed, you know, it’s just an attitude about work. The people I was working with were basically nice people and interested in doing a job and we had a competitive attitude in doing things and we were all young and had families and we did the best we could with what we had.

INTERVIEWER: Is there any other information that you would like to share with researchers about your experience or position with the Railway Post Office and this can be anything from interesting things that you may have seen on or off the train and funny stories that you might have?

Jack Ruben: Nothing really that comes to mind these days. It’s a long time ago.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember if any of the other clerks were playing pranks on one another?

Jack Ruben: Of course. Not so much on the – well, I didn’t see too much on the road but I did see a lot in the terminals.

INTERVIEWER: What types of things did you guys do in the terminals?

Jack Ruben: Well, at the Air Mail Facilities, you had to weigh your mail as they came in, so we’d set somebody up, a new man usually, and tell him that one -- this guy was very talented in guessing weight so he didn’t have to really do much, he just kind of picked them up. So we convinced this guy to get on this other guy’s back and put his hands over his shoulder and he would guess his weight. When he did that, he would just run down between a line of other guys who were already with paddles and paddled this other guy as he ran down the aisle. So he got a lesson that way.

And then when we were at Kennedy, Idlewild at that time, we would tell people, knowing that we were in transportation that they’d have to go to foreign countries and distribute mail. They couldn’t just stay here and somebody would be go into the office and type up a letter with this guy’s name on it telling him he had a report to London or Berlin or somewhere and be there for three months or something. It wasn’t too funny to the guy it would happen to but everybody else was in on it. Those were the kind of things we did.  No one got hurt too badly.

INTERVIEWER: On the train, do you remember seeing any like weird objects go through the mail, just stuff that we might not normally ship through the mail today?

Jack Ruben: Yes, we used to have a lot of bees. I remember that. Bees and what else did we get that was on? Other than bees, I don’t recall. I might --

INTERVIEWER: Go ahead.

Jack Ruben: I imagine it’s still being done. I don’t know what the requirements are but bees are -- I didn’t like handling bees.

INTERVIEWER: Did any ever get loose on the railcars?

Jack Ruben: Not for me. I never had that experience.

INTERVIEWER: Do you remember if you saw any interesting sights during your layovers when you had time?

Jack Ruben: I didn’t have too much time. Usually, we didn’t have too much layover to go sightseeing. We went to nice restaurants if we had some available -- in Boston or Buffalo we had some nice places we could go to eat. We tried different places. And even though I wasn’t a regular that subs through out there, the guys were very accepting and after a while they knew me, so it was very acceptable and it was a good feeling. You had a good feeling you were accepted. I was accepted anyhow. It was a good environment for me and I was learning all the time. I didn’t realize it but I was learning and I put it to use later on in my career.