My First Day on the Job As A Telegrapher

"DS RY EAT," I slowly clicked out on the telegraph key, using my fist. When the Train Dispatcher replied, "OK DS," I heaved a sigh of relief and immediately cut out all of the telegraph lines in the office, achieving blessed silence after my first morning on the job as an agent-operator. Even though I had spent many months as a telegraph student under my father who was agent for the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad in Avon Park, FL, there was a tremendous difference between that and in being only 18 years old and having total responsibility for an agency, including all telegraphic communications in the office.

That day in February 1942, began my seniority as a telegrapher on the Ocala District(Division) of the ACL. I had arrived before daylight on train No. 38 to relieve the agent, W. K. Jenkins, who would be absent for about a week, attending the annual convention of the Order of Railroad Telegraphers, of which he was an officer. Raiford FL was a very small town, located about 45 miles southwest of Jacksonville on the ACL line running from Jacksonville to St. Petersburg. It was a one-man agency, but it was home to the only penitentiary in the state at that time, which meant that it was a fairly busy office.

In a one-man agency, the agent was responsible for everything - passenger business, freight business, Railway Express (the United Parcel Service of the day) packages and Western Union telegrams. He, and it was nearly always "he" in those days, even swept the floors, dusted the furniture and cleaned the restrooms, if there were any. Many agencies did not have indoor plumbing. Some had no electric lights. Raiford had both.

I had no concerns about my ability to handle the railroad and Railway Express agency work. My father had trained me well in those aspects of railroading. But telegraphy was another matter. It's sort of like learning a foreign language and at the same time patting your head and rubbing your stomach. It requires considerably more practice than the average young person is likely to perform. The solution is to jump in and sink or swim. Raiford was my first jump

I had always been intrigued by telegraphy. I can recall as a small boy going with my mother and younger brother to the bandstand in a park in the middle of downtown Avon Park where telegraph instruments and a blackboard had been set up for the relay of the baseball World Series. This must have been in 1928, as the St. Louis Cardinals were in the World Series that year and they held their spring training in Avon Park at that time. The Seaboard Airline Railway agent, A. O. Kinsey, the Western Union agent, whose name I do not remember, and my father, the ACL agent, all took turns copying the telegraph transmissions from the games and posting the play by play, inning by inning results on the blackboard. There was a large crowd and I can still recall the sense of pride that I had, that it was my father telling all of these people about the World Series. That was the beginning of my interest, but I didn't seriously attempt to learn how to do it until my senior year in high school, after I had decided that I wanted to make railroading my career.

At Raiford, as in all the one-man agencies, the agent was required to keep a different set of accounts for each of the two or three hats that he wore, railroad, Railway Express and, sometimes, Western Union. In larger towns there were usually separate Western Union offices, thus the railroad agent-telegrapher had no Western Union responsibility, except in emergencies. Each agency had a large "Cash Book," which my father taught me must be balanced at the end of each day, for keeping the railroad account. Railroad station accounting was a double entry system, but was different from normal accounting, or bookkeeping as it was known then. Money received was entered as a debit, while money deposited to the railroad account was entered as a credit.

The agent also was paid separately for each hat that he wore. The railroad paid a salary ranging from $100 to $150 per month at that time, while Railway Express and Western Union paid a commission based upon the cost of shipments or telegrams handled. The difference between the two was that Railway Express paid a commission on both collect and prepaid shipments, either inbound or outbound, while Western Union only paid a commission on collect telegrams received and prepaid telegrams sent.

The Western Union commission policies resulted in the agent at Raiford performing considerable work for which he received no pay. Inmates at the state penitentiary manufactured the automobile license plates for the entire state. The County Clerk in each county would order license plates, by Western Union telegram sent prepaid. Penitentiary officials would notify the County Clerks of license plates shipped, by Western Union telegram sent collect. These types of telegrams constituted the bulk of the Western Union business at Raiford, thus the agent received no commission on the largest part of his Western Union work. To make matters worse, the telegrams consisted largely of groups of mixed letters and numbers for each category of license plates ordered or shipped. As any telegrapher will tell you, mixed groups of letters and numbers are probably the most difficult for a telegraph operator to copy or send.

Needless to say, I struggled mightily during those first few days to copy the license plate telegrams. The Western Union relay operators in Jacksonville had very little patience with a beginning operator. Fortunately, G. M. Faircloth, agent at Lake Butler, FL, only seven miles away, took pity on me and copied the inbound telegrams as they were sent to me, then called me on the commercial telephone (there was no company telephone) to verify that I had copied them correctly. I might not have made it through those days without his assistance and in my youth I am certain that I failed to thank him adequately.

On the other hand, the outbound shipments of license plates to the various County Clerks throughout the state did result in commissions being paid by Railway Express. Railway Express commissions ranged from ten per cent down to six per cent, based on the volume of business in a given location. These commissions kept the license plate business from being a complete loss to the Raiford agent.

Raiford had the usual assortment of telegraph wires running through the office, a dispatcher's wire, No. 17, with an alternate, No. 16, a Western Union wire, and two or three other, local wires. I cannot recall if there was a "bluestone" battery located at Raiford to serve as a power booster, but many of the one-man agencies did have them. The local agent had some responsibility in maintaining these batteries, but the signalman came by on a regular basis to assure that they were working properly.

At that time all communications on the Division were by Morse telegraph, company mail or U. S. Mail. The telegraph wires were never silent except at noon as everyone listened for the time signal. It was the strain of listening for "RY RY RY" in what seemed to be a cacophony of dots and dashes that caused me to seek silence by cutting out the wires in the office while I ate my lunch on that first day on the job. Eventually I learned to hear the call sign of whatever office I was in as easily as picking my own name out of the buzz of conversation in a crowded room. But, that was months away from that first day in Raiford. --------Warren McFarland

Member L. A. Bailey writes:

Warren McFarland's memories of his first day as a telegrapher at Raiford reminded me of my experiences there a few years later, with a different agent in charge. I was a Utility Clerk at the time and displaced the utility clerk at Raiford, not a popular move. The clerk just happened to be the agent's wife and also the sister of another telegraph operator. What I remember most about that time is that the agent had a standing order with a local moonshiner for a gallon of moonshine to be delivered to his barn each month. He did most of his drinking at home, out in the barn, but kept his "sipping" bottle behind one of the green file boxes in the depot. After a few months, the utility clerk position was abolished and I determined to go to telegraph school after being assured by Ocala District Chief Dispatcher B. B. Vaughn that there would be an increased need for telegraphers due to the imminent imposition of the 40 hour work week. I have never regretted that decision. ---- BA @ CW