THE NEGRO WORKERS
The West Indian negro contributed about 60 per cent of the brawn
required to build the Panama Canal. When the United States undertook
the work the West Indian negro had a bad reputation as a workman. It
was said that he lacked physical strength; that he had little or no
pluck; that he was absolutely unreliable; that he was unusually
susceptible to disease; and that in view of these things the canal
never could be finished if he were to supply the greater part of the
labor. But he lived down this bad reputation in large part, and,
although it must be admitted that he is shiftless always, inconstant
frequently, and exasperating as a rule, he developed into a good
workman.
The Government paid the West Indian laborer 90 cents a day, furnished
him with free lodgings in quarters, and sold him three square meals a
day for 9 cents each, a total of 27 cents a day for board and lodging.
On the balance of 63 cents, the West Indian negro who saved was able
to go back home and become a sort of Rockefeller among his
compatriots. His possible savings, as a matter of fact, were about two
and a half times the total wages he received in his native country.
But the sanitary quarters, and the necessarily strict discipline
maintained therein, did not please him. He yearned for his thatched
hut in the "bush," for his family, and the freedom of the tropical
world. Thus the homesickness of the well-quartered, well-fed negro
became a greater hindrance to the work than the ill-fed condition of
the "bush dweller." The result was that the commission reached the
conclusion that it could better maintain a suitable force by allowing
the negroes to live as they chose. Therefore, permission was given
them to live in the "bush," and about nine-tenths of them promptly
exchanged the sanitary restrictions of the commission quarters, and
the wholesome food of the commission mess kitchen, for the _dolce far
niente_ of the "bush." The result of this experiment in larger liberty
was in part a success and in part a failure. The list of names on the
roll of workers was largely lengthened, but there was no great
addition to the force of the men at work on any given day. It was a
common saying in the Zone that if the negro were paid twice as much he
would work only half as long. Most of them worked about four days a
week and enjoyed themselves the other three. It may be that the "bush
dweller" was not fed as scientifically as the man in the quarters, but
he had his chickens, his yam and bean patch, his family and his
fiddle, and he made up in enjoyment what he lost in scientific care.
Marriage bonds are loose in the West Indies, and common-law marriages
are the rule rather than the exception. But, as one traveled across
the Isthmus and saw the hundreds of little thatched huts lining the
edge of the jungle, he could see that the families who lived there
seemed to be as happy, and the children as numerous, as though both
civil and religious marriage ceremonies had bound man and wife
together.
When the Americans first began work it was an accepted dictum that one
Spaniard or one Italian could do as much work as three negroes. The
negroes seemed to be weak. It took six of them to carry a railroad tie
where two Spaniards might carry it as well. This belief that the
Spaniard was more efficient than the negro stirred the West Indians to
get down to work, and in a year or two they were almost as efficient
while they were working as were the Spaniards, but the Spaniards
worked six days a week while the negroes worked only four.
Of course there were those who spent practically everything as they
made it, and they constituted no small percentage of the total negro
force. But, on the other hand, some of the negroes were industrious,
constant, and thrifty. They saved all they could, working steadily for
a year or two, and then went back to Jamaica or Barbados to invest
their money in a bit of land and become freeholders and consequently
better citizens.
The negro laborers at first were obtained by recruiting agents at work
in the various West Indian Islands, principally Jamaica and Barbados.
The recruiting service carried about 30,000 to the Isthmus, of whom
20,000 were from Barbados and 6,000 from Jamaica. It was not more than
a year or two, however, after the work got under way, until there was
little occasion for recruiting. Every ship that went back to Barbados
or to Jamaica carried with it some who had made what they considered
a sufficient fortune. Every community possessed those who had gone to
Panama with only the clothes on their backs, a small tin trunk, a
dollar canvas steamer chair and, mayhap, a few chickens; and who had
come back with savings enough to set them up for life. This fired
dozens from each of those same communities with the desire to go and
do likewise. The result was that the canal employment lists were kept
full by those who came on their own initiative.
The terms of entrance to the Canal Zone were easy, the steerage fares
were low, and as a result the excess of arrivals over departures
sometimes amounted to 20,000 in a single year. The steamship companies
had to keep careful and persistent watch to prevent stowaways. Even at
that there were hundreds who sought to reach the Isthmus in this way
in spite of the fact that they were usually carried back without being
permitted to land at Colon.
There was little or no friction between the whites and the blacks on
the Canal Zone. This immunity from racial clashes resulted from two
causes--one was the incomparable courtesy of the West Indian negro and
the other his knowledge that he could expect good treatment only so
long as he kept out of trouble. Few of them, indeed, were ever
inclined to be offensive. They are usually educated in the three
"R's," and are also very polite. Ask one a question and the answer
will be: "Oh, yes, Sir," or "Oh, no, Sir," or if he has not
understood, "Beg pardon, Sir." He would no more omit the honorific
than a Japanese maiden addressing her father would forget to call him
"Honorable."
The different types of West Indian negroes found on the Canal Zone
constituted an endless study in human characteristics. They were all
great lovers of travel, and no regular train ever made a trip without
from two to half a dozen coaches filled with them. After pay day
practically every negro on the Zone was wont to get out and get a
glimpse of the country.
Without exception they are adepts in carrying things on their heads;
consequently, they usually possess an erect carriage and splendid
bearing. It is said that the first ambition of a West Indian negro
child is to learn to carry things on its head in imitation of its
parents. Frequently a negro will be seen with nothing in either hand,
but carrying a closed umbrella balanced horizontally on his head. Once
in a while one may be seen to get a letter from the post office, place
it on top of his head, weight it down with a stone, and march off
without any apparent knowledge that he has executed a circus stunt.
Some of the negroes who came to work on the canal never saw a
wheelbarrow before arriving there. Upon one occasion some French
negroes from Martinique were placed on a job of pick and shovel work.
Three of them loaded a wheelbarrow with earth, then one of them
stooped down, the other two put the wheelbarrow on his head and he
walked away with it. But, with all of his inexperience, the Martinique
negro proved to be the best West Indian worker on the canal.
The Martinique negroes were the most picturesque of all the West
Indians on the job. The women wore striking though simple costumes,
bandana handkerchiefs around their heads, and bright-colored calico
dresses usually caught up on one side or at the back, thus
anticipating the Parisian fashion of the slit skirt by many years.
A large number of the negroes lived in small tenement houses built by
private capital, and oftener than not one room served the entire
family. Nearly every one of the American settlements had its West
Indian quarter where these buildings and the Chinese stores flourished
to the exclusion of everything else. At the Pacific end of the Panama
Railroad there was a suburb known as Caledonia, which was given over
almost entirely to West Indian families. One could drive through there
any day and see half-grown children dressed only in Eden's garb. In
other parts of the canal territory one saw very few naked children
except in the back streets of Colon.
The Government took the best of care of the negroes on the work during
the entire construction period. There were hospital facilities at both
ends of the canal and sick camps along the line. The commissary
protected them against extortion by the native merchants and gave them
the same favorable rates enjoyed by the Americans. The color line was
kindly but firmly drawn throughout the work, the negroes being
designated as silver employees and the Americans as gold employees.
The post offices had signs indicating which entrances were for silver
employees and which for gold employees. The commissaries had the same
provisions, and the railroad company made the general distinction as
much as it could by first and second class passenger rates. Very few
of the negroes ever made any protest against this. Once in awhile an
American negro would go to the post office and be told that he must
call at the "silver" window. He would protest for awhile, but finding
it useless, would acquiesce.
The idea of speaking of "silver and gold employees," rather than black
and white employees, was originated by E. J. Williams, Jr., the
disbursing officer of the Canal Commission. He first put this
designation on the entrances to the pay car and it was immediately
adopted as the solution of the troubles growing out of the
intermingling of the races.
One of the most interesting experiences that could come to any visitor
to the Isthmus was a trip across the Zone on the pay car; to see 24
tons of silver and 1,600 pounds of gold paid out for a single month's
work; and to watch the 30,000 negroes, the 5,000 Americans, and the
3,000 or 4,000 Europeans on the job file through the pay car and get
their money. The negroes were usually a good-natured, grinning lot of
men and boys, but they were wont to get impatient, not with the amount
of money they drew but with its weight. Under an agreement with the
Panama Government the Canal Commission endeavored to keep the Panaman
silver money at par. Two dollars Panaman money was worth one dollar
American, and the employees were paid in Panaman coin. Thus a negro
who earned $22 during the month would get 44 of the "spiggoty"
dollars. These "spiggoty" dollars are the same size as our own silver
dollars and to carry them around was something of a task.
When the negroes were asked what they proposed to do with their money
the almost invariable reply was: "Put it to a good use, sir." American
money was always at a premium with them and the money-changers in the
various towns usually did a land-office business on pay day.
Paper money was not used on the pay car at all. In the first place,
there was always danger of its blowing away, and in the second place
paper money in the hands of negro workmen soon assumed a most
unsanitary condition. The negroes were always desirous of getting
American paper money because they could send it home more cheaply than
gold.
Large numbers of West Indian women, the majority of them with their
relatives, lived on the Zone during the construction period. They were
for the most part industrious and made very good household servants.
They were nearly always polite and deferential, some of them even
saying, "Please, Ma'am," when saying "Good morning."
It was a rare experience to travel on a ship carrying workers to the
Canal Zone from the Islands of the West Indies. Ships calling at
Kingston, Jamaica, would usually take on a hundred or more passengers.
They would be quartered either forward or aft on the main deck. They
would carry aboard with them all kinds of small packages. Some would
have small boxes of chickens or pigeons, and some little old
sawbuck-fashioned folding beds covered with canvas. As soon as
inspected by the doctor for trachoma each negro would select the most
favorable spot, gather his furniture around him, and settle down in
one place, there to remain almost without moving during the whole of
the 40-hour trip across the Caribbean. When the water was fine and the
sailing smooth the first cabin passengers might conclude that they
were carrying a negro camp meeting. On the other hand, if the weather
were bad and the sea rough, a sicker lot of people nowhere might be
found. One of the favorite negro preventives of seasickness is St.
Thomas bay rum applied liberally to the face, although to the
on-looker it never seems to prevent or cure a single case.
Before landing at Colon every one of these negroes had to be
vaccinated. Almost without exception they tried to prevent the virus
"taking" by rubbing the scarified spot with lime juice or with some
other preparation. Meals on board generally consisted of rice and
potatoes, and, perhaps, coffee and bread. One might see a dozen young
girls in a group eating with one hand and with the other polishing
their complexions with the half of a lime.
With all his faults--and they were not few--the West Indian negro
laborer probably was the best workman that could have been employed
for the job at Panama. He was usually as irresponsible, as carefree,
and yet as reliable a workman as our own American cottonfield hand. He
made a law-abiding citizen on the Zone, was tractable as a workman,
and pretty certain always to make a fair return to the United States
on the money it paid him in wages.
Under the firm but gentle guidance of the master American hand, he
did his work so well that he has forever erased from the record of his
kind certain charges of inefficiency and laziness that had long stood
as a black mark against him.
The Canal Commission so appreciated his good work that it made
arrangements to return him to his native country when his services no
longer were required, there to take up the life he led before he heard
the call of the "spiggoty" dollars that took him across the Caribbean.
He will miss the life on the Isthmus. He was worked harder, he was
treated better, and he was paid higher wages there than he ever will
be again in his life. Perhaps he has saved; if so, he retires to be a
nabob. Perhaps he has wasted; if so, he must go back to the
hand-to-mouth existence that he knew in the days before.
But after all, the experience of the thousands of West Indian negroes
employed on the canal will have a stimulating effect on their home
countries, and their general level of industrial and social conditions
will be raised.
At any rate, the American Republic always must stand indebted to these
easy-going, care-free black men who supplied the brawn to break the
giant back of Culebra.