Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1904-01-22
BOSTON STREET RAILWAY.

Editor of the HERALD;
As at least three island Pond ex-resi-
dents are engaged I'm street railroading
in Boston, there must be many of your
readers who will be interested in know
ing something of how the business is
conducted.
The Boston Elevated Railway Com
pany, is perhaps the greatest system in
the world of street railways including
under one management the elevated
and surface lines. 1t has several hun
dred miles of track and some ten thou
sand employees. Its men are paid in
cash weekly by paymasters who visit the
various stables on stated days. The
Company pays the best wages of any
similar road that know of, and in ad-
dition to the regular wages offers re-
ward of Sl5 to be paid at the end of the
calendar year for satisfactory service.
This has just been paid for the year
1908, ninety-one per cent of the men re.
ceiving it, including the above three
ex-Island Ponders, W. A. Moore, j. F.
Ladd and W. p. Stevens. | understand
it took over $60,O0O00 to meet this one
item.
When a man enters the service he be
gins at the foot of the list, as he did il
the old Grand Trunk days, and perhaps
does now. There are nine divisions
with car stables in all excepting one, the
eighth, which is city proper, and has NJ
conductors or motormen. 1t takes some
time to work up to where one gets cal
to run every day, and previous to tina
time the employee runs extra anf
"catches" days work through some on
being absent from duty. The extr
man is guaranteed $3.50 a day, bu
stands chance of getting more by The
: above mentioned circumstance of all
sences.
, / had been here some ten month
, when l got my first car. Conductor
it is obviously harder for them to reu
der satisfactory service than iJ is TO
the motorman. The conductor
brought in contact with all sorts an
conditions of men; he must submit t
insults and sneers and arguments, an
meet all with smiling face. He woul
5 not be human if he did not retalat
2 once in a while, then he gets reporte
E and perhaps discharged, or perhaps +,
: signs. The motorman has very seriou
: responsibilities, but they pertain chief
to handling his car his railroad life i
{ therefore apt to be longer and const
quently the extra man does not advanc
as fast as the extra conductor. Bot
CoiluuCUoiS anu tuotoilfe. TeCclNe vi
same wages for the same periods G
9 service; stripe is put upon the Goa
! sleeve every five years aud five cent e,
ira pay goes with each stripe up to tn
fourth one.
AS cars start every few minutes
would take an army of call boys to ca
the men, they are, therefore, expecte
:. to report in season to leave on tim,
i Failing to do so, an extra man take
l the car for the day; the tardy man i
e given "miss card" which he takes t
: the superintendent's Office where it zoe
o on record. Too many black spots O
this record endanger the $500 rewar
= as we'll as the position, yet there reall
:, seems to be no reason why man shout
not keep within bounds, for the dispC
sition of the Company is to be generous
and am sure every superintendent o.
!, the road has been personally very sorr
It to report unfavorably of any OF his mel
n Having written up some of the pre-
v liminaries l will soon give you some O
my experiences on the "hind end" of
car. w
Everett, Mass, January, l6, 1904.