Last updated: April 24, 2023
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Fact or Fiction: Did Pullman use Scrip?
Fact or Fiction…? The workers at Pullman Palace Car Company were paid in scrip instead of cash and were only allowed to purchase products and services within the Pullman town in the 19th century.
Evidence. There were many mining and lumbering towns built and managed by companies in the 19th century before the town of Pullman existed. Quite a few, especially in the expanding Western territories in the United States, paid their workers in company scrip—that is, money that could only be used at a company owned businesses but not anywhere else outside of the town. This system often left workers indebted to the company they labored for and made it difficult to secure funds to move elsewhere or grow their own economic wealth.
Did the Pullman Palace Car Company run a similar payment system for its workers? Land south of Chicago was purchased by George M. Pullman in 1879 and was to be used for both industrial and residential purposes. Construction on the Town of Pullman and Pullman car shops first started in 1880. The first residents began to move in soon afterwards a year later. The Chicago Tribune published an article in 1882 highlighting that the wages workers received were cash. Their salaries varied from $1.25 per day for the common laborer to as much as $3.00 for carpenters and silverplaters [1].
Initially, when paying workers, the Pullman Company would automatically deduct rent from a worker’s check if they lived in the town. When an Illinois law challenged this practice, the company changed wage distribution so that workers received two checks instead: one check that was the exact amount of rent owed and a second check with the remaining wages. It was expected that the worker would return the first check directly back to the Pullman Bank once they received it [2].
The Pullman Strike of 1894 provided more documentation of a closer look at how workers were paid. In the Report on the Pullman Strike of June-July, 1894 by the United States Strike Commission, it is observed that, “Prior to June, 1893, all went well and as designed; the corporation was very prosperous, paid ample and satisfactory wages, as a rule, and charged rents which cause no complaint”. [3] However, in part due to the Panic of 1893, the workers’ wages dropped causing financial strain for those who lived both in and out of the Pullman Town. For instance, seamstresses who earned $39.85 a month were comparatively earning $22.14 a month instead by April 1894 [4]. These reduction in wages was a part of the grievances expressed by the Pullman workers during the strike. However, there is no evidence of workers ever being paid in scrip.
Conclusion. While some company towns during the nineteenth century may have provided payment to workers in the form of scrip, the Pullman Palace Car Company paid their workers in cash.
Works Cited
[1] Chicago Tribune, April 26, 1882, p. 8.
[2] United States Strike Commission, Report on the Pullman Strike of June-July 1894, XXXV.
[3] Ibid, XXII.
[4] Ibid, XXXIV.
Evidence. There were many mining and lumbering towns built and managed by companies in the 19th century before the town of Pullman existed. Quite a few, especially in the expanding Western territories in the United States, paid their workers in company scrip—that is, money that could only be used at a company owned businesses but not anywhere else outside of the town. This system often left workers indebted to the company they labored for and made it difficult to secure funds to move elsewhere or grow their own economic wealth.
Did the Pullman Palace Car Company run a similar payment system for its workers? Land south of Chicago was purchased by George M. Pullman in 1879 and was to be used for both industrial and residential purposes. Construction on the Town of Pullman and Pullman car shops first started in 1880. The first residents began to move in soon afterwards a year later. The Chicago Tribune published an article in 1882 highlighting that the wages workers received were cash. Their salaries varied from $1.25 per day for the common laborer to as much as $3.00 for carpenters and silverplaters [1].
Initially, when paying workers, the Pullman Company would automatically deduct rent from a worker’s check if they lived in the town. When an Illinois law challenged this practice, the company changed wage distribution so that workers received two checks instead: one check that was the exact amount of rent owed and a second check with the remaining wages. It was expected that the worker would return the first check directly back to the Pullman Bank once they received it [2].
The Pullman Strike of 1894 provided more documentation of a closer look at how workers were paid. In the Report on the Pullman Strike of June-July, 1894 by the United States Strike Commission, it is observed that, “Prior to June, 1893, all went well and as designed; the corporation was very prosperous, paid ample and satisfactory wages, as a rule, and charged rents which cause no complaint”. [3] However, in part due to the Panic of 1893, the workers’ wages dropped causing financial strain for those who lived both in and out of the Pullman Town. For instance, seamstresses who earned $39.85 a month were comparatively earning $22.14 a month instead by April 1894 [4]. These reduction in wages was a part of the grievances expressed by the Pullman workers during the strike. However, there is no evidence of workers ever being paid in scrip.
Conclusion. While some company towns during the nineteenth century may have provided payment to workers in the form of scrip, the Pullman Palace Car Company paid their workers in cash.
Works Cited
[1] Chicago Tribune, April 26, 1882, p. 8.
[2] United States Strike Commission, Report on the Pullman Strike of June-July 1894, XXXV.
[3] Ibid, XXII.
[4] Ibid, XXXIV.