1914-12-22poppa

“The Street railway service is becoming worse instead of btter and the complaints each day are piling up”

          Hamilton Herald.   December 22, 1914

While complaints about the service provided by the Hamilton Street Railway (HSR) were hardly new, the chorus of denunciations about the HSR reached a very high level at the year 1914 was coming to an end.

On December 22, 1914, the Hamilton Herald published the first in a series of articles on the state of service provided by the company, the company which had never regained the hostility towards it engendered during the bitter strike of 1906.

The article began by recounting a common question heard every day :

“ ‘Isn’t this a rotten service?’ is the usual morning salutation. One has merely to board a car to hear the voice of the people in regard to the service.”¹

               ¹ “More Kicking Over ‘Rotten’ Service : Passengers in All Parts of City Complain About Street Cars : Feeling is That City Should Check Service and Apply Remedy”

Hamilton Herald.   December 22, 1914

Dissatisfied riders of the electric street cars operated by the HSR used the system throughout the city, the people who resided in the south and northeast districts were complaining the most bitterly:

“This morning about eight minutes before 9 o’clock three cars rounded the corner of King street and Sherman avenue. The first two were well-filled, while the last contained one passenger.

“The next car did not put in an appearance until 9:10 o’clock and it was packed to the doors when it reached Fairleigh avenue, where several shivering pieces of humanity went aboard. The car stopped at every street from Fairleigh avenue until it reached the corner of King and James streets, either for passengers to alight or the familiar ‘just one more’ to get on.

“ ‘Step up to the front, gentlemen,’ continually pleaded the conductor, but unfortunately, there was no room for further advancing movements unless to place the motorman in peril of being shoved through the vestibule.”¹

One resident of the east end told a Herald that overly packed street cars were common:

“ ‘ Such conditions as this exist every day. I have ridden on the cars for several months during the morning hours, and have not yet secured a seat, as the cars are usually crowded when they reach Holton avenue.’ ”¹

The annoyed HSR fare payers wondered when the politicians at Hamilton City Hall were not interested in their problems, claiming that it could be easily proved that the company was not running a proper service.

The HSR motormen and conductors were targets for much of the passenger unrest:

“In addition to complaints about the service, the Barton street patrons are just as much incensed against some of the car crews, because it is felt that the carelessness of the men is largely responsible for the bad service there

“This morning about 8 o’clock a passenger rushed out to get a car at St. Matthew’s avenue. He was in time to run straight in front of car No. 453 and wave his hand for the motorman to stop.

“The motorman turned his head with a smile and made not the slightest effort to stop.

“ ‘He could have stopped that car in a second, a kid could have done that with the air brakes,’ said an old street railwayman who saw the incident. ‘That is the kind of thing that gets the company in wrong.’

“The passenger walked from St. Matthew’s avenue to Wellington street before another car came along, which shows what time he lost through his inability to persuade the motorman to stop the car.”¹

It seemed that the managers of the HSR were fully aware of the critical article which had appeared in the press:

“Things were humming in street railway circles yesterday afternoon, following the publication of the Herald, in which were a few of the thousands of complaints against the poor service.”²

² “ Side Show Men Could Get Tips Here : House Upside Down Weak Imitation of Street Car stunts : Feeble Attempt Was Made to Remedy Matters in Spots Yesterday”

Hamilton Herald.   December 23, 1914.

The HSR management decided abruptly to add more street cars in selected lines in response to the article:

“From the sudden appearance of cars on the East King street service, passengers guessed that all the employees at the car barns made a rush to assist the head office.

“There were cars galore on East King street about 5 o’clock, but the strange part about the jumble of wheels was the amateur management of the business to meet the demands of the public.”²

An example of the hasty and poorly-thought reactions to the Herald article was the way that two street cars were coupled together and sent out:

“This pairing arrangement was strange. The first of the two cars would be labelled ‘Jockey club’ and would make the full course, while the second would be ‘King and James only.’

“Of course, the first car couldn’t stop to pick up passengers, as it would be behind the schedule. The result was that the second car was jammed, and the first car usually carried only the conductor and motorman.”

The Herald reporter hopped about Car # 422 which was heading south:

“That car seldom heads toward the mountain without being jammed from door to door.

“The rule of the company is ‘no passengers in the rear vestibule,’ and, accordingly, the people are herded into the car and the rear door slammed shut to prevent them tumbling out the back.

“When the car starts, the strap hangers are swung loose from their moorings, and stray feet meet stray feet, the result being hard on bunions.

“When the car stops, many a married man is put in an embarrassing position by falling into some pretty young lady’s lap.”²

A little later the Herald reporter hopped on an East Barton street car where he witnessed the following:

“It was about 6 o’clock, and the woman was returning from uptown, and had a baby with her. She had put her go-cart in the rear vestibule. When she arrived at her street, the rear vestibule was packed as usual, and she had difficulty in getting the go-cart.

“ ‘Hurry up, you’re delaying the car,’ shouted the conductor.

“ ‘I’m hurrying as much as I can,’ said the lady, ‘but I can’t get the cart out.’

“ ‘You should be home getting your husband’s supper instead of holding up the cars at this hour,’ snapped back the conductor.

“The woman, thus ridiculed in front of a crowd, was quite embarrassed. A stranger stepped forward towards the conductor, and could hardly keep his hands off the man.

“ ‘It is a good job for you that the lady is not my wife, or even a friend of mine, or I’d knock your block off,’ he said to the man in uniform, who remarked that the rules of the road made him a constable.”²

The Herald reporter tracked down an official with the Hamilton Street Railway company who frankly admitted that the company was not keeping on schedule, and that it could not do so if it had a thousand extra cars.

HSR would not be improved and complaints about delays and overcrowding would continue.