BENEVOLENT AND PROTECTIVE ORDER OF RAMBLERS
The Benevolent and Protective Order of Ramblers is supposed to be a semi-secret organization of the floating fraternity, but its membership is composed of a small number of Chicago’s “home guards.” It was organized by John X. Kelly and has no benefits nor program except that the members agree to help one another when in trouble. It holds meetings (for members only) now and then, but it does not aim to deal with any economic or social problems. The “Ramblers” endeavors to add a human touch to the migrant’s life. It is, in short, a hobo good-fellowship club that meets where and when it is convenient to drink the “milk o’ human kindness” and to sing “Hail! Hail! You Ought to Be a Rambler.”
HOBO CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENTS
Dissatisfied with things as they are, the hobo experiments now and again with co-operative projects. Most of these are attempts to do on a small scale what the dreamers hope to accomplish in the future on a larger, a national, or an international scale. That co-operative organizations failed is no discredit to the leaders nor any conclusive proof against the value of co-operative movements as a motive in economic life. The failure is to be explained at least in part by the egocentricity and individualism or the irresponsibility of the migratory workers.
Of the following five interesting cases of co-operative projects among migratory workers, only one took place in Chicago. The story of all of these attempts has, however, been written by the prime mover of them, John X. Kelly. Sooner or later all hobo co-operative experiments end the same way. They fail because of suspicion and lack of harmony.
61. My first attempt to organize a co-operative scheme was in 1909 in Redlands, California. I knew a group of men; some of them radical and all of them idealists. It occurred to me that they were the very types to make a communistic plan work. I knew of a tract of land, one hundred and sixty acres, open for settlement. Fourteen dollars to file a claim and a little additional expense and labor would have put the place in working condition.
I presented my plan to these men and ten of them approved the idea. They had all been soap-boxers and agitators and I felt that here at last is a group of men who can make a co-operative organization a success. Our scheme was very simple, everyone was to bear his share of the burden and to receive his share of the profits. No matter what a man did as long as it was part of the work of running the farm would be considered as important as any other part. The government of the place would be absolutely democratic. A manager would be elected from the number and he would remain manager for a certain term or as long as he gave satisfaction. The land was to be divided up as follows: each man was to have a five acre plot as his individual property and the other hundred and ten acres of ground was to be worked co-operatively.
We had scarcely got organized when dissensions arose. Some were satisfied with the manager but others feared him and mistrusted him. Some declared that it was impossible to determine how much of one kind of work was equal to another kind of work. Some were not satisfied because they felt that they were going to be imposed on and they would not join an organization in which there was no assurance that they would get a square deal. The result of this disputation was the breakup of the movement. Each man went his way.
My second endeavor to promote a hobo co-operative movement was in 1917 in St. Louis. It was in the winter time and there were many idle men in town. I conceived what I thought was the most modern and up to date plan ever brought into being to promote the interests of the down-and-outs. Knowing that the unemployed were being exploited by semi-religious and charitable organizations who gave little in return for much work, I set about to solve the problem in another way. Dr. James Eads How of St. Louis, founder of the International Brotherhood Welfare Association, contributed $200 to be used as follows: $100 to be spent for a horse and wagon, $50 for a gasoline engine and a saw, while the rest was to be used to buy food until funds could be had for the sale of wood. It was a reserve fund only to be used in case of emergency. A saloon-keeper gave us the use of a yard in East St. Louis free of charge. There was an old store in connection with the yard that could also be used. The place was in the heart of East St. Louis and accessible to any part of the city. The American Car Repairing Company gave us all the wood we cared to haul away. Eleven policemen sent in orders for wood. They were willing to pay three dollars a load for this wood sawed and split into kindling.