Concordia Library: Great Depression: Riding the Rails

Did You Know . . .

Famous people who were 'hoboes' and rode the rails:

Oil billionaire H. L. Hunt
Pulitzer author James Michener
Novelist Jack London
Poet Carl Sandburg

-During the Great Depression as many as 1.5 million hoboes rode the rails.

-As many as 250,000 teens were thought to have ridden the rails.

Riding the Rails Web Resources

Riding the Rails
PBS
Riding the Rails
LivingHistoryFarm
Hitchhiking
LivingHistoryFarm.org
The History of Hobo Art

Hobo Language

Chalk signs used by hoboes for the benefit of their comrades who follow. There was a "brotherhood of hoboes" - an oath that hoboes took. Hoboes were not bums. They worked.

HOBOES: SIGNS. - Chalk Signs Used By Hoboes For The Benefit Of Their Comrades Who Follow.. Fine Art. Encyclopædia Britannica Image Quest. Web. 14 Jan 2012