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♪ [music playing--"This Old Train" by Jeremy Taylor] ♪♪.
(male voice-over). The difficult job of delivering
mail across entire states each day required an immense amount
of team work.
For those new to the job, they found help in the seniority
of fellow clerks who mentored them.
And while at times there was competition between clerks
in sorting the mail, at the end of everyday each clerk
was responsible for making sure he did whatever necessary
in helping others complete the shared task.
(Mr. Moody). You had to work together,
if you didn't, the clerk in charge would get on you
if you was caught up and wasn't helping somebody else.
Nobody ever had to be asked, they just volunteered to do it.
(Mr. W. Waldman). Everybody worked hard together.
It was really a good bunch of guys to work with.
You had a little bit people from different areas and it was
a really really good time working.
I really enjoyed it.
(Mr. Hight). I think there was
a little competition you know between men.
Yeah, I got my mail worked before you did, but everybody
worked until all the mail was worked out.
That was I think the difference of any other organization I ever
worked for everybody worked until all the mail
was worked up.
(Mr. Kesterson). It was one of those deals
that if somebody needed some help everybody
would pitch in and help.
I mean it wasn't like now a days you know that is your job
and now I have my job, everybody chipped in and helped because
our main goal was to get the mail out and that's what we did.
(Mr. Liszewski). I'd say about 95%
worked well together.
And I was surprised we had a lot of older clerks.
Matter of fact, when I started I think his seniority date
was 1920, and he took me under his wing real well
and treated me like his son.
(Mr. Glasco). I think we all
experienced that there was someone out there that
would look out for you.
And the thing that amazed me which you don't find today,
if one person got caught up with his job and you were done you
went and helped him.
The sooner all of you got done the sooner you could relax and
have a little bit of rest before you got to the next destination.
(Mr. Kesterson). A lot of them
it was kind of funny it was, some of them were cards
and some of them didn't want to work but most the guys
were really nice.
And I was asked earlier about you know getting along with
everybody, well everybody was in, you had a 30 foot space
it was 9 feet wide and you had a walkway to go through plus you
had your storage where your stuff was at and you had
6, 7 guys in there, you had to get along.
(male voice-over). Whether it was
just the motion of the train or the close knit quarters,
many railway postal clerks found ways to keep
the job exciting, although, sometimes inadvertently.
With long days of rigorous and repetitive work, many clerks
enjoyed the infrequent surprises that were often and simply part
of the job.
(Mr. Bliss). These cars had drawers
in most of them where you put your clothes you know.
Where you changed clothes and put your clothes in there
and so forth.
But when those tables or those drawers start coming out of that
cabinet, you know you think boy is he going to get around this
curve before we go on the ground you know and they come out like
that and you're hanging on you know it gets you get,
well are we going to make it?
(Mr. Moody). And one thing about it,
it makes coffee drinkers out of you.
One guy on the crew had a little steam pot up on the side
of the car back by the restroom and the guys carried
a tin coffee bucket.
And one guy made the coffee, put it in that steam thing,
covered it with a mail sack till it got done and everybody had
to chip in to help him pay for the coffee.
And a time or two, somebody complained about it,
he'd threaten to just go over to the door and pour it all out.
So there was a lot of good times on it.
(Mr. Mitchell). [unclear audio] we used to pull
off on the side on a passenger train and let
the freight train go by.
We seemed to always pull down there by a watermelon patch,
I don't know what.
We did get watermelon.
(Mr. Hight). When I worked on
the City of New Orleans train one, first pouch I caught
was a Peotone, which is north of Kankakee.
The last one I caught that night was just north of Memphis,
so that's a few towns in between.
I'd like to say I caught them all but I am afraid I didn't.
(Mr. Kesterson). You mean you didn't
get reprimanded?
I got reprimanded when I knocked one down.
Then the clerk in charge tried it and he knocked it down
and nothing more was said about it.
(Mr. Hight). I didn't say that.
(Mr. Glasco). Chicago was the coldest place
I have ever been in my life in winter time.
Twelfth Street Station was a tunnel like and you get off
the train and that air coming down, that wind it just,
you didn't quit carrying a jacket until July.
July the 4th, we thought that we could quit carrying a jacket
for a couple months.
(Mr. Liszewski). That was the good thing
about working on the Chicago Memphis.
You could leave Chicago snow be on the ground, get to Memphis
the flowers was blooming.
(Mr. Glasco). That was very true.
(Mr. Liszewski). I mean the whole different kind
of country going though.
(Mr. Waldman). We had one time
the guys dumped the pouch and there was a snake in it.
It had came from another train line so they think somebody
was messing with somebody but that got a little excitement.
(Mr. Hight). I guess one
of my scariest moments is working from Carbondale
to Chicago and the train from Birmingham came into Carbondale
and they had the police out surrounding things.
And they were transferring a very high value registered mail
to our car and I had the misfortune of being
the register clerk.
He said, when you get to Chicago, they will meet you
at the train and escort you to the post office.
Well, we got to Chicago there wasn't anyone there except
the guy who was going to take the mail off the train.
So I got in the mail truck and took this to the
Chicago Post Office and I told him I said, I thought I was
suppose to get an escort from the station to the depot
or I mean the post office.
Oh he says, we trust you, and in Carbondale I was surrounded
by police but in Chicago, you're on your own.
(Mr. W. Waldman). I was making a trip
from Chicago to St. Louis one time as a sub.
We were going along, usually they put the mail car right
behind the engines but on this for some reason it was
on the back.
We were going through the country you know it's starting
to slow down and everybody well what's going on?
We went and looked and here we were out in the middle
of nowhere.
We came unhooked and the train went on.
We were sitting out there in the middle of nowhere you know.
They were at the next town before they every realized we
weren't even on there so they had to come back and pick us up.
We worked we had work to do so it wasn't nothing bad it just
kind of strange to be sitting out there in the middle
of nowhere hoping another train didn't come along and if they
did they saw us you know.
(Mr. Liszewski). To me it wasn't real hard work
but you got tired cause you worked quite a few hours.
But boy when you seen them big city buildings there in Chicago,
you felt a lot better.
♪ [music playing--"This Old Train" by Jeremy Taylor] ♪♪.