Past Issues :: 2006 July 14 :: Cover Story
Hobo 101: The down and out found strength and hope in Ben Reitman's Hobo College
If you are homeless or have an interest in the rights and history of
the homeless you need to know the story of Ben Reitman and the long-lost Hobo
College. Founded in 1907, Ben Reitman's remarkable Hobo College presented
an unprecedented effort to address the needs of Chicago's down and out.
A welcoming center and medical clinic by day, an intellectual forum and educational
facility by night, the Hobo College served to empower Chicago's homeless
population in a way never seen before or since — nonsecular and nonhierarchical.
And for nearly three decades, it actually worked.
A History of Homelessness
Although vagrancy had been an issue in the United States since the Civil War, the homeless crisis first came to the forefront of national politics during the economic depression of the early 1890s and again later in the late 1920s, when thousands of families were displaced during the Great Depression. During these lean years, thousands of men took to the road in search of work, hopping freight trains, living in hobo jungles and cheap boardinghouses and working as migrant laborers.
At the center of it all was Chicago (known to hoboes as "The Big Chi"), the hub of the nation's railroad lines, where between 300,000 and 500,000 refugees passed through each year during the '20s and '30s.
"Chicago was the gathering point for migrants as it was the jumping point to all points West," said Roger Bruns, author of "Knights of the Road: A Hobo History." "It was the natural place to look for seasonal work in harvesting, logging or crop picking and to reside in the winter months when there was no work."
Slowly West Madison Street saw its former upper-crust residences transform into a "main stem" of dilapidated tenements, seedy bars, diners, cheap theatres and shabby hotels inhabited by dozens of hoboes and tramps. But with the poverty there also was some serious intellectual fare.
"There was a creation of a whole culture along the West Madison Street area and in the freight yards," Bruns said. "This included many authors such as Theodore Dreiser and Carl Sandburg, as well as many sociologists from the University of Chicago who were studying patterns of social migration."
With the mass influx in homeless population, The Salvation Army, the
YMCA and other religious organizations began to recruit on West Madison
Street, holding revivals and opening their doors to Chicago's displaced.
While the charities provided immediate relief to the needy, living quarters
were cramped to capacity, meals were known for their mediocrity and tenants
had a limit of one week's stay. Many hoboes preferred instead to board at
one of the many cheap hotels to forgo the religious sermons for their
own independence and self-pride.
Most problematic was an anti-homeless attitude emanated by religious organizations of the day. Charities believed that the hobo lifestyle was a sin, and that by being homeless they were in need of repentance.
"Religious charities tried to get recruits and save them," said Franklin Rosemont, author of "Hobohemia" and a member of Charles H. Kerr Publishers in Chicago. "They were fundamentally authoritarian. They made them pray and had strict regulations…it was very condescending."
It was evident that there was a need for an organization to directly address the needs of the displaced without the moral baggage. James Eads How, heir to his family's wealth in the Wabash Railroad, realized the opportunity, and in 1907 he founded the International Brotherhood Welfare Association, or IBWA, dedicated to serving the poor and lobbying for the rights of the homeless. How also launched a new phenomena: hobo colleges, alternative educational environments for people on the streets. He started colleges in major cities across the United States and also ran a newspaper, "The Hobo News." The IBWA was heavily influenced by How's socialist politics, and it was at the St. Louis Hobo College where he fatefully met and befriended Dr. Ben Reitman who, under How's guidance, went on to found the largest and most successful Hobo College.
A College of and by the Homeless
It is no surprise the Chicago Hobo College was a success — if anyone could pull off managing such a project, it was the flamboyant and charismatic Dr. Ben Reitman. Reitman had a rare knack for bridging the barriers between the outcasts and authority. Once a "Hobo King" himself, Reitman was also a doctor who worked with tramps and prostitutes, was an abortion provider and birth control advocate before either were legal, and was probably best known for his ability at attracting the attention of the media (for 10 years he was press agent and lover of anarchist Emma Goldman, whose notoriety is owed almost entirely to Reitman's promotion).
Under the good doctor's lead as master of ceremonies, Reitman's Hobo College flourished. With his networking ability, he amassed a faculty that included leading professors at area colleges and the best soapboxers of Chicago, alongside featured guest appearances by luminaries such as lawyer and author Clarence Darrow, the notorious con-man Yellow Kid Weil and tramp author Jim Tully.
"There was always a meal and coffee, and food was served," Rosemont said. "Then there was a debate or lecture followed by question and answer. Some characters showed up at all the meetings and were notorious for haranguing and refuting everything that was said. Some were single-tax advocates, some anarchists, but all had at least some opinion."
Firsthand accounts describe a room with a capacity for 150, ramshackle furniture, a lending library of discarded books from the public library, and walls displaying portraits of Mark Twain, Karl Marx, and Charles Darwin made by alumni. Handbills and posters advertised "classes" on topics including successful panhandling, "how to survive without eating," street speaking, the history of vagrancy, philosophy of the road and the curiously dubbed "Will the Coming Christ be a Hobo?" Occasionally actors and musicians made guest appearances at the Hobo College, including noted actor Richard Bennett and company and a remarkable performance by opera star Mary Garden.
More importantly, the Hobo College provided the homeless the chance to express and educate themselves, share their ideas, songs and poetry, and provide a place where they could be treated with respect.
"The Hobo College was run by and for the hoboes. It didn't make demands or try to convert anyone," said Todd DePastino, author of "Citizen Hobo: How a Century of Homelessness Shaped America." "It provided a model of citizenship and an opportunity for self-education. It not only allowed homeless people to become part of an active system, it made them take on leadership roles. This idea is very foreign today."
Most impressively, the Hobo College grew to be a well-known center for debate.
Rosemont related stories about University of Chicago professors bringing their classes to the Hobo College because the debates were livelier than lectures at the universities. Often, the student debate teams would face off against a team of resident hoboes, only to be thoroughly humiliated by the hobo soapboxers.
As like any college, each spring the Hobo College held a graduating ceremony in which hoboes who had faithfully attended lectures throughout the winter months would receive diplomas. Graduation was marked by food, music and speeches, and concluded with Reitman handing out papers stating:
"Be It Known To All The World That ____ has been a student at THE HOBO COLLEGE and has attended the lectures, discussions, clinics, musicals, readings and visits to art galleries and theatres. He has also expressed a desire to get an education, better his own conditions and help build a better world that will be without unemployment, poverty, wars, prostitution, ignorance and injustice. He pledges himself to try individually to live a clean, honest, manly life, and to take care of his health and morals, and abstain from all habits that undermine his health and better nature. He agrees to cooperate with all people and organizations that are really trying to abolish poverty and misery and to work to build a better world in which to live."
A Lost Cause?
As the labor market changed and there was less need for seasonal labor, the hobo became a vanishing species and with him so went the Hobo College. Dramatic shifts in urban patterns of living saw the demolition of thousands of single-occupancy tenements and the relocation of the poor to suburban areas. "Homeless now meant you were houseless," Depastino said. "That is why the homeless problem is so devastating today. These areas were zoned out of existence."
Today the Hobo College remains but a historical footnote, its few remnants scattered in special collections at private libraries around the world. Yet what we do know of the story of Ben Reitman's Hobo College remains refreshing and visionary. In comparison to today's programs for the homeless, the Hobo College was raw, alive and inspiring.
"There is a great deal to be learned from the Hobo College in how to develop organic programs for the homeless," DePastino said. "There already exists a homeless subculture. We can build around this subculture and engage social service programs that promote a real and radical democracy."
"I don't know much about social service programs of today but I rarely hear homeless people say good things about them," Rosemont said. "There is little genuine care in many of the programs — they are almost entirely church-based and have rigorous rules. They can learn a lot from the Hobo College, but I'm not sure they are ready to learn."
In this light, Reitman's Hobo College provides a working model of a self-help program for and by the needy that is urgent and relevant to today's homeless crisis. And in this sense, the Hobo College serves as a utopian ideal of how our social service programs could function — or as Roger Bruns describes it, "an oasis in a homeless man's desert of despair."
- Sources:
- "Citizen Hobo: How a Century of Homelessness Shaped America" by Todd DePastino
- "The Damndest Radical: The Life And World Of Ben Reitman" by Roger Bruns
- "Down and Out, On the Road: The Homeless in American History" by Kenneth Kusmer
- "Hobohemia" by Franklin Rosemont
- "Knights of the Road: A Hobo History" by Roger Bruns
- "Public Forums in Chicago" by Sophia Fagin