Difference between revisions of "Bowler Derby"
(New page: Bowler Derby Armies of tramps rode the rails in the 1870s and 1880s. Their high numbers got them noticed; so did their close association in the public mind with labor unions and strikes...) |
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Popular opinion got full value from its fear of the “tramp menace,” with articles and illustrations that emphasized the sensational depravity of the vagrant. | Popular opinion got full value from its fear of the “tramp menace,” with articles and illustrations that emphasized the sensational depravity of the vagrant. | ||
| − | + | —David Hammond | |
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| + | [[category:Headgear Relating to Tramping]] | ||
Latest revision as of 18:43, 17 May 2009
Bowler Derby
Armies of tramps rode the rails in the 1870s and 1880s.
Their high numbers got them noticed; so did their close association in the public mind with labor unions and strikes, which many saw as a crime against economic and social morality.
Many who traveled did so to work. They laid track, cut timber, dug mines, built buildings, shoveled coal, labored in factories, worked on ranches and farms, picked fruit, and flooded into the Great Plains every year to work the harvest.
They did every hard and dirty job, and their mobility was a valuable asset to a national economy where labor needs rose and fell from season to season and from year to year.
Still, the first charge against the tramp was his rejection of steady work and home life. The presence along the roads and rails of “yeggs” (thugs) and beggars was another.
Popular opinion got full value from its fear of the “tramp menace,” with articles and illustrations that emphasized the sensational depravity of the vagrant.
—David Hammond
