MiningmanMike weighs in: 1940 Erie RR Working Manual Dining Car Service
Isn't it interesting that this perfectly follows good restaurant practice ... on trains where specific multiple seatings due to high passenger load aren't required? None of that Pullman rigmarole about writing your own meal and bar tab here! (And they make the point elsewhere in the manual about serving Pullman attendants their meals, so no question some of these were Pullman-equipped trains subject to Pullman operating procedure ...)
And here, in 1940, it is assumed that a waiter will not only be literate, but know how to write. What might be interesting would be to see if the Dining Car Society has earlier versions of the Erie (or Lackawanna) dining-car manuals, to see how the checks were handled around the turn of the century, particularly if some other procedure was followed in issuing and taking up the checks.
I would ask anyone who has access to one of the Southern railroad dining-car manuals to post or transcribe the relevant section(s) here for comparison. There might be interesting differences with sociological import.
Overmod charlie hebdo I guess a simple admission of error on your part is too much to expect, however. When I'm in error, I assure you you'll be among the first to know. (As has happened at least a number of times in the past, I should add...) That time isn't yet, though, here. And I am assuredly not wrong about needing to research this controversy in fair and open terms ... which was and continues to be my original and unrevised view, and is decidedly not yours.
charlie hebdo I guess a simple admission of error on your part is too much to expect, however.
When I'm in error, I assure you you'll be among the first to know. (As has happened at least a number of times in the past, I should add...)
That time isn't yet, though, here. And I am assuredly not wrong about needing to research this controversy in fair and open terms ... which was and continues to be my original and unrevised view, and is decidedly not yours.
You can continue with your contrafactual narrative, but at this point it is I who provided some factual research, while all you've done is...
charlie hebdoI guess a simple admission of error on your part is too much to expect, however.
Overmod charlie hebdo As I learned long ago, always be cautious about the words of someone who cites a source to support his theory and then, when it turns out that same source actually says the opposite, he attempts to dismiss that same source. And as I learned -- probably not quite as long ago, but probably in the ballpark -- be even more cautious about the words of someone who mistakes scientific procedure for advocacy, attributes 'theories' to people who merely advocate open discussion of others' theories (and then attempt to demonize them for so doing, a frequent academic tactic but never a particularly justifiable or moral one), or who considers invocation of an invented binomial opposite as a red herring for recognition of insufficient statistics and then attempts to cut off debate as if this proved two-faced argumentation (or whatever). Best to stick to discussion of the facts based on better sources -- as you've already started to do. You won't regain any moral high ground trying to continue the other tactics as you have.
charlie hebdo As I learned long ago, always be cautious about the words of someone who cites a source to support his theory and then, when it turns out that same source actually says the opposite, he attempts to dismiss that same source.
And as I learned -- probably not quite as long ago, but probably in the ballpark -- be even more cautious about the words of someone who mistakes scientific procedure for advocacy, attributes 'theories' to people who merely advocate open discussion of others' theories (and then attempt to demonize them for so doing, a frequent academic tactic but never a particularly justifiable or moral one), or who considers invocation of an invented binomial opposite as a red herring for recognition of insufficient statistics and then attempts to cut off debate as if this proved two-faced argumentation (or whatever).
Best to stick to discussion of the facts based on better sources -- as you've already started to do. You won't regain any moral high ground trying to continue the other tactics as you have.
Well, it's pleasant to see you are attempting to revise your views to be congruent with factual presentations which are in accord with NKP's original post. I guess a simple admission of error on your part is too much to expect, however.
charlie hebdoAs I learned long ago, always be cautious about the words of someone who cites a source to support his theory and then, when it turns out that same source actually says the opposite, he attempts to dismiss that same source.
Mike weighs in:
1940 Erie RR Working Manual Dining Car Service
Flintlock76Ummm, gentlemen, has anyone thought that possibly menu cards were given to the passengers to fill out because it was more efficient that way? ... "Get 'em in, get 'em out." That's probably all there was to it.
Personally, I hope so. (The only flaw in the magic-20 argument is that the head waiter becomes the block in the critical path, as he must go to every table and read the orders back in full before any actual food preparation has occurred; that's much, much more realtime per seating than almost any practical alternative. "Calling" works in a Waffle House because all the 'seating' is fully rotating; when one table is turned another set of customers comes promptly to it, and the voice calling is hence distributed rather than dependent on a whole seated group of people coming in together (ask any Waffle House manager why they so fear buses...) In one of these seatings, everyone has to be seated in, and at least one table has to have filled out all its little checks, before the head waiter can 'do his thing' and any actual cooking to order or food deliveries can commence... as opposed in particular to just filling out the checks and handing them to a passing waiter to be put in the pipeline, easily up to a couple of minutes quicker for no perceivable loss in accuracy OR fraud prevention...)
Incidentally, unlike the misrepresentation, "my" actual personal 'theory' on this is more or less the null hypothesis that the reading-back of the ticket is part of the anti-fraud procedure, not some tacit or paternalistic accommodation for the illiterate. My concern was that it wasn't science to dismiss at least the possibility of some operative accommodation without actually researching it -- which is what was being autocratically propounded.
Since we are now actually researching it, with a fair amount of proper scientific disregard for the social red herrings, I have no hesitation in affirming that I hope charlie hebdo is completely justified in thinking the convention had, at any point in history, NO purpose of accommodating illiterate waiters.
Flintlock761880's is a good starting date, the cars were certainly big enough by that time to allow a kitchen, pantry, and dining space.
Everyone actually interested in this topic needs to read the relevant section in White's The American Passenger Car. The history, particularly associated with Pullman, is more complex and richer than you probably imagine.
In particular, the discussion of the evolution of 'hotel cars' (which evolved into the Pullman buffet cars) are interesting, as they are a road that continues to be taken but is clearly secondary to what developed as the 'dining car experience', specifically with regard to the ordering 'rituals'.
Flintlock76As far as I know the cars were operated by the railroads themselves.
Yes, but... I think you will find that the manuals on how to run their customer service were produced by the Pullman people, and almost incidentally printed up for individual railroads with their names on the cover. I'm sure that at least some roads had 'individual touches' of their own.
That of course stops well short of the individual cooking documentation, where individual roads had occasionally fiercely individual menus and preparation techniques. Occasionally these can be surprisingly undetailed (as is the case for PRR, which seemingly used bargain-price materials out of the commissary to work its gastronomic magic) although others had more specific detail (those of you preparing the Lobster Newburg at home know some of what I mean). To the extent cuisine was a competitive weapon -- it certainly was to the B&O -- it isn't surprising to see railroads keeping this part of the dining-car operations 'proprietary'.
charlie hebdo"According to Sutch and Carter in a new five-volume compilation called Historical Statistics, the percentage of former slaves who said they couldn't read or write plummeted after emancipation. Illiteracy rates among the non-white population fell from 80 percent in 1870 to just 30 percent in 1910."
Very good and useful information - thank you!
I'd particularly trust these two because they are professionally aware -- and have in fact commented on -- bias introduced by conscious manipulation of statistical information. They themselves have noted that the information in these volumes is closer to raw data than many, perhaps most historical 'statistical' analyses, and that researchers may have to work more, for example to prove or disprove a given hypothesis, than in other similar compendia.
6. In 1910, the illiteracy rate among all whites was 5%, while foreign-born was 12.7%, blacks 30.5%.
In 1940, 2% whites, 9% foreign-born, and blacks 11.5%. https://nces.ed.gov/naal/lit_history.asp
I believe the data tells the tale accurately. Yes, illiteracy rates were higher for blacks, but dropped dramatically. Why would the blacks hired in the early 20th century for one of the better jobs available, according to the Nye book, be illiterate, when 70% could read and write?
5. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5189912 "According to Sutch and Carter in a new five-volume compilation called Historical Statistics, the percentage of former slaves who said they couldn't read or write plummeted after emancipation. Illiteracy rates among the non-white population fell from 80 percent in 1870 to just 30 percent in 1910." - Historical Statistics of the United States Millennium edition. Carter, Gartner, Haines, Olmstead, Sutch and Wright, eds. (2006).
1880's is a good starting date, the cars were certainly big enough by that time to allow a kitchen, pantry, and dining space. Also, from my reading of Lucius Beebe's books on the "good old days" I don't remember him mentioning any dining cars before the 1880's.
As far as I know the cars were operated by the railroads themselves. The one exception I can think of would be the Santa Fe dining cars in the 20th Century operated by the Fred Harvey organization.
4. When did dining cars become commonplace? Late 1880s AFAIK. Who operated them, Pullman or the railroads? This thread was about dining car practice of writng out the order, not the Pullman sleepers.
With respect to all, literacy, or lack of, has nothing to do with card menus, again it's all about efficiency.
A card menu is a limited menu, therefore it cuts down on indecision and irresolution on the part of the customer. Ever been in a restaurant with a multi-page menu and seen the indecision on the part of some people? I have. I'm sure we all have. A card menu is a diplomatic way of saying "Here's your choices, decide. Now. Please."
Also, if a particular item on the menu is sold out it's an easy matter to draw a line through it to show non-availability. You can't do that with a 'book" menu without ruining the thing. That's not a problem with a "one-time-use" card menu, they're made to be tossed anyway.
And of course, card menus take up a lot less space at the table (and elsewhere) than a book menu does.
Again, efficiency. A limited menu also means easier logistics as far a stocking the diner kitchen is concerned. There wasn't a lot of space in those kitchens and pantries to begin with. it's amazing what they accomplished in there.
Don't overthink this gents. Sometimes the simplest answer is the best.
3. Drawing on my own rather fuzzy recollections of dining car services from the mid 1950s through late 1960s, I recall the practice of writing one's order was typical if not universal. I also do not recall a particularly high percentge of the waiters being black. More than one or two (out of an admittedly small sample size of ~20) were white. Perhaps that depended on the railroad line?
2. As I learned long ago, always be cautious about the words of someone who cites a source to support his theory and then, when it turns out that same source actually says the opposite, he attempts to dismiss that same source.
1. Some people make an assumption that the waiters in dining cars in the period 1890-1960 were illiterate and therefore passenger had to write out their orders. If so, how would the illiterate waiters or cooks be able to comprehend the order correctly? Firestorm's theory (Flintlock's wife) makes sense. The noise theory also makes sense. With absolutely no evidence however, Overmod continues to push his theory. Folks can draw their own conclusions as to motivations.
Ummm, gentlemen, has anyone thought that possibly menu cards were given to the passengers to fill out because it was more efficient that way?
Big train, one dining car. The SOP, that's "Standard Operating Procedure" to you non-veterans out there, had to be "Get 'em in, get 'em fed, get 'em out, make room for the others." Politely of course.
Lady Firestorm worked as a waitress through high school and college. She agrees with my supposition. "Get 'em in, get 'em out."
That's probably all there was to it.
MiningmanOvermod--That would be something to look forward to. Decent people out there trying to have an interesting conversation, trying to fix a mess and try to talk about things honestly are met by others who make it more difficult and make the decent people look like the lunatic fringe. In the end the decent people will win and the other will lose because the other are lying and the decent ones are not. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.
Decent people out there trying to have an interesting conversation, trying to fix a mess and try to talk about things honestly are met by others who make it more difficult and make the decent people look like the lunatic fringe. In the end the decent people will win and the other will lose because the other are lying and the decent ones are not.
Now back to our regularly scheduled program.
A work location I supervised was tasked with the job of distributing pay checks (the days before direct deposit) to employees in the late 1970's - employees were required to sign for their paychecks - there were still employees who could only 'place their mark' on the appropriate document and that 'mark' had to be witnessed by two other individuals who could write. That I observed at the time, there was no racial distinction on who were placing their mark.
As an aside - the current point of sale credit card terminal screens - I cannot write on them and have it look anything like my signature, therefore those machines get my mark.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Overmod--That would be something to look forward to.
charlie hebdoPointing out that someone spends a thousand words to say something erroneous is not an ad hominem attack, my friend.
It is when it's not erroneous, but you're dying to establish that the sayer is ... somehow.
The source I cited (and I appreciate your pointing out he is a journalist and not a historian, although the test does remain at least partly whether his sources are accurate) said nothing about the literacy of the great majority of black Pullman employees. You seem obsessed with proving something that on the face of it is highly unlikely ... historically ... and that would be a fine opinion except that even now you're denying it as hard as you can, and making fun of other people into the bargain.
You are right in one thing, it's feeble historiography not to look into this issue in more depth. Which I will do over the next month or so, as I'm in a position to access sources with access to the necessary materials, both on the development of operations at the Pullman Company and on aspects of illiteracy in the first 'freed' generations. I'm quite sure there is material to lay this question to rest, perhaps definitively; I'll let you all know what I find.
Surely you can do better than that 'compulsive scrivening' line (especially if you're trying to elevate your prose above verbiage). And racism in the 1890s, or the 1920s was different in many aspects from racism in the last few years -- and understanding some of those aspects, not "racism" in the definition du jour, is important in understanding the history. Yes, most of the 'racisms' in American history are reprehensible, and in fact I consider many of the ones in the period we were discussing to be even more odious than the ones we see in resurgence in the last few years -- when I'd think America as a whole would have learned better. That does not change the need to comprehend the earlier practices in context and be able to discuss them rationally and dispassionately when necessary.
Pointing out that someone spends a thousand words to say something erroneous is not an ad hominem attack, my friend. You may think you are a polymath but the source you cited, whom I then quoted, says the opposite of what you claimed. Even a feeble historian does better than that. And putting scam in the same sentence with climate is another of your cutsie opinions which you try to obfuscate by compulsive scrivening. And BTW, racism was racism in the 19th C, too. Or did you think slavery was something else? Or Jim Crow laws were not racist?
charlie hebdo Cutting through your usual verbiage...
Why, what do you know? An ad hominem; how surprising and unusual! (Of course, if the best someone of your professional and academic standing can come up with is a criticism of syntax, and that does seem to be most of the case, it does not speak too well of your actual comprehension of American history...)
(including the ludicrous assertion that the climate crisis is a European scam)...
Once more, there you go again, hitting submit before you've quite gotten your brain in gear with the reading comprehension ... you should really learn to be more careful in addressing what's said, since as I recall you're really critical of others who do it to you or your favorites.
I said nothing one way or the other about the likely fact of AGW (or the consequences from it, even when more severe than current demonstrated theories warrant); in fact I agree with many of the areas that should be watched. What I was disagreeing with was the climate scam, with particular reference to the game you're even now trying to play on this forum: the mocking disregard of opposition even before any evidence is considered, the demonstrated scheming to ruin academic careers of non-AGW proponents, the intentionally malformed mechanism used to 'reconsider' adverse evidence or to rethink established popular theories that no longer hold water as they did when propounded. I have in the past drawn parallels between what goes on in much of the use and abuse of 'climate science' and what the scholarly community in Europe engaged in over the phlogiston theory. In both cases it's a lamentable, and in my opinion mockable, example of the abuses to which science can be put when it embraces what turns out to be a Big Lie that many of its well-heeled backers find expedient. The particular argument being not that the discourse is wrong but that it is unthinkable even to consider alternative thinking.
... yet another apologia for a racist myth...
But that is precisely the thing that hasn't been established yet. We are not trying to prove that illiterate darkies who couldn't read a lick were letting that good ol' headwaiter fella cover up their shame. On the other hand, you haven't established much more than a (justified) dislike of anything in past eras that doesn't match current views of 'racism', and some highly anecdotal pick-and-choose comments about largely inapplicable cohorts of potential 'waiters'.
Now, nothing would make me happier than if your case could be proven: that what we had at the formation of the Pullman 'restaurant service' was an Ulrich B. Phillips history turned on its head, instead of happy darkies singing on the plantation in the magnolia-scented moonlight we had a generation of ex-slaves who all learned to read -- not just print but handwriting too, with perfect fidelity -- in less than a generation, and taught their children so effectively that they, too, became perfectly literate. So that not only applicants for porter positions, but even lowly waiters would be perfectly able to read and write as part of their job position, how fortunate in an age where perfect literacy was so little respected by the post-Reconstruction white power elite that there were few better jobs to be had than the cut-rate opportunities robber-baron George was doling out. And the best part is that for your argument to work, you'll have to establish that most ex-slaves were literate. I'm looking forward to seeing the sources you quote for that; I need hear no more of your own opinions, which I think you have established about as well as you're able to.
... and for those who still subscribe to those attitudes on here.
If you learn nothing else about the craft of history, learn this: you can't judge the attitudes and practices of people in the past by modern attitudes. And, more to the point, you can at best practice a worthless kind of Procrustean history by trying.
On the other hand, I am personally affronted by a rude claim that I am somehow a racist for so doing, that I continue to regard black people as if they were inherently illiterate or constitute a structural underclass (or whatever) today, or that I am somehow insulting an inchoate sense of self-worth by wondering what the source of a rather unnecessary practice -- at a company almost as renowned as Waffle House for making careful rules and then practices to avoid things it got caught doing wrong -- might be.
In my opinion (as I said, I haven't studied this area at all carefully from the necessary untainted sources) there would likely have been a culture of instilling literacy, as well as other careful wisdom, in new hires who might have been illiterate in any sense. I'd like to think there were many examples of mentorship as the years passed, the Pullman 'opportunity' remaining a good one for getting out of being locked into poverty or any of the other things that might hold a man back from self-realization. None of that even so much as justifies an attempt to suppress any debate on the subject whatsoever because someone, somewhere, might apply a PC 'racism' test to it as if that in and of itself proved something.
The author you mention, Larry Tye (a fine journalist, though not a historian, BTW) wrote in his book "Rising from the Rails" the following passages:
Oh look: "many" ... "more than a few" ... my goodness, whole "Scores"... That sure is a large number compared to the few poor ex-slaves and their children who survived the dreaded discrimination of the Reconstruction era and the 'new discrimination' after. Wonder why illiteracy was such a cause celebre for folks establishing attempts at educational institutions in those years; I guess they all failed for want of enough students with everyone reading already, well enough to educate themselves from newspapers and such.[/quote]
I do appreciate your attitude against racism, though, and support your stand toward 'changing hearts and minds' wherever you actually encounter it. It's just that this point, here in this thread, isn't one such. (And no, I haven't missed the codewords for what I consider improperly-racial excusing here, and yes, I don't much care for that either.)
Overmod Paul of Covington In light of the strong evidence presented, I will shut up. You should never shut up because possibly-PC or -revisionist sources have been quoted and people have tried to demonize you for having an opinion. That's the way the whole European climate scam acquired momentum. Tye, for one, clearly thinks uneducated blacks were hired on by Pullman in large numbers, at least according to a recent article on the Smithsonian web site (perhaps not one of the better scholarly reference sources, but also not to be ignored). From their article on "Five Things to Know About Pullman Porters" (I suspect you will quickly determine several things about the level of scholarship by the author's tone) "Slaves had already done the hard work of building many of the United States’ railroad lines. Pullman, who was as shrewd a businessman as he was a showman, felt that servant-like attendants would give riders an even keener sense of comfort and self-indulgence. So he hired former slaves—known to be cheap workers—to staff his palace cars. As historian Larry Tye writes, the saying went, “Abe Lincoln freed the slaves and George Pullman hired 'em.” Why people here would think the argument applying to porters wouldn't apply to the less-critical wait staff in either 'hotel cars' or the evolved version of dining cars is unclear to me, but it certainly couldn't be to the point of discouragement on some ultimately-rather-vague racial PC without grounds, as at least one poster seems to think. Frankly, I have little interest in matters of contemporary race-based shame as self-filters of historical fact, and I don't intend to go looking for examples, pro or con, for the hypothesis that the practice of the head waiter reading back the order to the customer might reflect a self-respect-saving means of addressing functional illiteracy (of handwritten checks, please remember) on the part of even one of the ordinary 'wait staff'. But there is clearly evidence in the historical record as interpreted by at least one professional historian to give at least credence to the idea, against which we have no real scholarly historical argument, in a legitimate professional sense, whatsoever. That makes it particularly dangerous to knuckle under to the usual sorts of bullying that so often pass for informed discourse in this modern world.
Paul of Covington In light of the strong evidence presented, I will shut up.
You should never shut up because possibly-PC or -revisionist sources have been quoted and people have tried to demonize you for having an opinion. That's the way the whole European climate scam acquired momentum.
Tye, for one, clearly thinks uneducated blacks were hired on by Pullman in large numbers, at least according to a recent article on the Smithsonian web site (perhaps not one of the better scholarly reference sources, but also not to be ignored). From their article on "Five Things to Know About Pullman Porters" (I suspect you will quickly determine several things about the level of scholarship by the author's tone)
"Slaves had already done the hard work of building many of the United States’ railroad lines. Pullman, who was as shrewd a businessman as he was a showman, felt that servant-like attendants would give riders an even keener sense of comfort and self-indulgence. So he hired former slaves—known to be cheap workers—to staff his palace cars. As historian Larry Tye writes, the saying went, “Abe Lincoln freed the slaves and George Pullman hired 'em.”
Why people here would think the argument applying to porters wouldn't apply to the less-critical wait staff in either 'hotel cars' or the evolved version of dining cars is unclear to me, but it certainly couldn't be to the point of discouragement on some ultimately-rather-vague racial PC without grounds, as at least one poster seems to think.
Frankly, I have little interest in matters of contemporary race-based shame as self-filters of historical fact, and I don't intend to go looking for examples, pro or con, for the hypothesis that the practice of the head waiter reading back the order to the customer might reflect a self-respect-saving means of addressing functional illiteracy (of handwritten checks, please remember) on the part of even one of the ordinary 'wait staff'. But there is clearly evidence in the historical record as interpreted by at least one professional historian to give at least credence to the idea, against which we have no real scholarly historical argument, in a legitimate professional sense, whatsoever. That makes it particularly dangerous to knuckle under to the usual sorts of bullying that so often pass for informed discourse in this modern world.
Cutting through your usual verbiage (including the ludicrous assertion that the climate crisis is a European scam) reveals yet another apologia for a racist myth designed for those who still subscribe to those attitudes on here. The author you mention, Larry Tye (a fine journalist, though not a historian, BTW) wrote in his book "Rising from the Rails" the following passages:"Their [porters'] self-education -- and, subsequently, that of their children -- is said to have begun when they read their passengers' discarded newspapers and magazines. But many porters were college graduates, and more than a few black trainmen were law school and medical school students who earned tuition working summers as dining car waiters. " And "Scores of former Pullman porters and dining car waiters excelled: Benjamin Mays, a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Bates College, who became president of Morehouse College; the explorer Matthew Henson, who helped discover the North Pole; and J. A. Rogers, whose 1917 novel, ''From 'Superman' to Man,'' remains one of the most authentic accounts of a Pullman porter's experiences."
I do not know how many of the posters on this thread grew up in the South in the forties. I did--and I knew at least two ladies of African ancestry who could neither read nor write; they were children of former slaves. I do not doubt that there were many more. Their children did have some education, and were literate.
Johnny
Paul of CovingtonIn light of the strong evidence presented, I will shut up.
In light of the strong evidence presented, I will shut up.
_____________
"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
NKP guy Paul of Covington I don't think of what I said as a contention. I was offering a suggestion as a possible reason for the practice. If anyone here knows, we need to hear from him or her I think it's past time that we here once and for all bury this contention, idea, or theory that even some African American waiters were illiterate and thus orders had to be written out by customers. In fact, there is no evidence anywhere that this was the case on any railroad in America. Ever. Do any of you own Railroads in the African American Experience by Theodore Kornweibel, Jr.? (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010) This scholarly work devotes an entire chapter of 20 pages to the subject of black waiters and cooks on trains, beginning with the very first in 1867 and 1868. These were Pullman employees. Throughout the chapter not one word is to be found supporting the idea that illiterate blacks were waiting table on whites at any time. In fact, throughout the chapter we read instances of white employees and passengers taking advantage of black waiters and cooks in many ways. Gentlemen, this is what racism looks like: A bunch of older white men theorizing that a practice that was likely required by a company for accuracy and accounting purposes, was actually a reflection of how ignorant, or uneducated, or culturally disadvantaged blacks were at any point in American history. Unless someone can cite any scholarly reference to this practice of writing dining car orders being due to supposedly illiterate black men in Pullman's or any railroad company's employ, I suggest we entertain other reasons why some people would posit or accept such inaccurate and demeaning explanations.
Paul of Covington I don't think of what I said as a contention. I was offering a suggestion as a possible reason for the practice. If anyone here knows, we need to hear from him or her
I think it's past time that we here once and for all bury this contention, idea, or theory that even some African American waiters were illiterate and thus orders had to be written out by customers. In fact, there is no evidence anywhere that this was the case on any railroad in America. Ever.
Do any of you own Railroads in the African American Experience by Theodore Kornweibel, Jr.? (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010) This scholarly work devotes an entire chapter of 20 pages to the subject of black waiters and cooks on trains, beginning with the very first in 1867 and 1868. These were Pullman employees. Throughout the chapter not one word is to be found supporting the idea that illiterate blacks were waiting table on whites at any time. In fact, throughout the chapter we read instances of white employees and passengers taking advantage of black waiters and cooks in many ways.
Gentlemen, this is what racism looks like: A bunch of older white men theorizing that a practice that was likely required by a company for accuracy and accounting purposes, was actually a reflection of how ignorant, or uneducated, or culturally disadvantaged blacks were at any point in American history.
Unless someone can cite any scholarly reference to this practice of writing dining car orders being due to supposedly illiterate black men in Pullman's or any railroad company's employ, I suggest we entertain other reasons why some people would posit or accept such inaccurate and demeaning explanations.
+1
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