THE COMMISSARY
To build the canal required the labor of some fifty thousand men. To
induce these men to go to Panama, to stay there, to work there, and to
work there efficiently, was no light undertaking. Health was promised
them by the most efficient sanitary organization that ever battled
with disease. Wealth was promised them, relatively speaking, in the
form of wages and salaries much higher than they could obtain at home
for the same work. But health and wealth, much desired and much prized
as they are, can not of themselves compensate for transplanting a man
to an alien shore and an alien atmosphere, especially if that shore be
tropic and that atmosphere hot. There must also be comfort.
And comfort was promised to the canal diggers by the commissary
department. Good food at prices cheaper than one pays in the United
States, and quarters of the best--these things the commissary held out
as a part of the rewards at Panama.
Of course this was not the chief object of the commissary
department--it was the incidental factor that in the end almost
obscured the main issue. The main business was so well done that
everybody took it for granted, just as no one will remark about the
sun shining although that is the most important fact we know. The main
business of the commissary was to keep the canal diggers fed and
housed so that they would have the strength for their tasks. How this
was done, how fresh beef and ice cream were made daily staples in
tropic Panama, how the canal army was fed, is a big story in itself.
The history of the French régime was such as to prejudice the whole
world against the canal region and to deter any but the most
adventurous spirit from entering there into a gamble with death. The
Americans soon found that without extraordinary inducements it would
be next to impossible to recruit a force able to build the canal.
Therefore it was determined to make the rewards so great that extra
dollars to be gained by going to Panama would outweigh the fears of
those who had any desire to go. It was decided to pay the employees of
the Canal Commission and the Panama Railroad Company wages and
salaries approximately one-half higher than those obtaining at home
for the same work. Furthermore, it was decided that the Government
should furnish free quarters, free medical service, free light, and
other items which enter into the expense budget of the average family.
It was found advisable to establish Government hotels, messes, and
kitchens, where the needs of every employee from the highest officer
to the most lowly negro laborer could be met, and to operate them at
cost.
Still another problem had to be faced; that of providing places where
the people employed in building the canal could escape from the high
prices fixed by the merchants of Panama and Colon. With this end in
view, a great department store, carrying upward of 5,000 different
articles, was built at Cristobal. This store established branches in
every settlement of canal workers where patrons could go to ship and
receive the benefit of prices much lower than those prevailing with
regular Panaman merchants.
Anyone who will study carefully the annual reports of the operation of
the commissary of the Panama Railroad Company, will realize what great
profits are made by the various middlemen in the United States who
handle food products between the producer and the consumer. In 1912
the commissary had gross sales amounting to $6,702,000, with purchases
amounting to $5,325,000. This represents a gross profit of 26 per
cent. The cost of transportation from New York and distribution on the
Isthmus, amounted to about 24 per cent, leaving a net profit of
approximately 2 per cent on the sales of goods. When it is remembered
that transportation of commissary products from New York amounted
approximately to a quarter of a million dollars a year, and that wagon
deliveries on the Isthmus added $50,000 a year to this, it will be
seen that the expenses of distribution at Panama were approximately on
the same footing with those in the United States.
In the case of dressed beef, one finds a most illuminating example of
how it is possible to sell the ordinary items of a family budget to
the consumer at rates much lower than those obtaining in the United
States. According to the most authentic information dressed beef laid
down at Panama costs more, quality for quality, than it costs the
ordinary retail butcher in the States. At one time in 1912 the
commissary was paying $11.94-1/4 a hundred pounds for whole dressed
beeves laid down in New York. This was for the best corn-fed western
steers, a grade of beef that is found only in the best retail butcher
shops of any American city. Yet, with the expense of ocean-refrigerator
carriage added, and with other operating costs equal to those of the
retail butcher in the States, the commissary found it possible to sell
to the consumer, delivered at his kitchen door, porterhouse steaks
from this beef at 20 cents, sirloin steaks and roasts at 19 cents, and
round steaks at 13 cents a pound. At this same time the average
American housewife was paying from 26 to 30 cents for porterhouse
steaks, from 22 to 26 cents for sirloin steaks and roasts, and from 17
to 22 cents for round steaks; and in the butcher shops in the United
States where grades of meat comparable to those at Panama were handled
the figures were usually around the top quotations.
One cannot escape asking the question how it is that if the Panama
Railroad commissary could pay approximately 12 cents a pound for
dressed beef at New York, deliver it in refrigeration at Cristobal,
thence to the housewife by train and wagon, and make a gross profit of
some 26 per cent by the operation, that the American retail butcher
can reasonably claim that at the price he sells his meat he is making
little or no net profit.
One finds the same scale of prices on other commodities at Panama as
meats. Only the very best goods are handled in the commissary. Any
reasonable need of any employee could be supplied by the commissary at
prices probably lower than a retail merchant in the United States
could buy the same commodities.
A few instances of how the commissary fared when its supply ran short
will serve to illustrate the grasping disposition of the average
Panaman merchant.
In one case high waters in the Chagres interrupted traffic on the
Panama Railroad, and the price of ice in Panama City promptly jumped
from 50 cents to $1 a hundred pounds. At another time a ship bringing
coffee to the Isthmus ran aground and the commissary had to buy coffee
in the Panama market. It had to pay 6 cents a pound more at wholesale
for the coffee than it was selling for at retail in Panama the day
before the ship went aground. On another occasion a vessel carrying a
supply of milk went ashore and the wholesale price of that commodity
jumped a hundred per cent overnight. The Panaman merchants made a long
and persistent fight to get the privilege of doing the business which
is done by the commissary, but the canal officials were too wise to
allow the working force to be dependent upon native business men for
family budget needs.
Although the commissary did an annual business of nearly $7,000,000 a
year during the height of the construction period, it received
comparatively little actual money for the commodities it sold. A great
deal of this business was with the subsistence department of the Canal
Commission, furnishing supplies for the hotels, European laborers'
messes, and common laborers' kitchens. Practically all of the
remainder was with the employees of the commission, and was done
through coupon books. When an individual wanted to buy from the
commissary he asked that a coupon book be issued him. If it were found
that he had sufficient money coming to him for services rendered to
cover the cost of the book, it was issued to him and the clerk in the
commissary detached coupons to cover the purchases. When the monthly
pay roll was made up, the cost of the coupon books was deducted from
the amount due the employee for services. Many employees and their
families lived too far away from the commissaries to make daily
visits, so they simply deposited their coupon books with the main
commissary at Cristobal and sent their orders in by mail from day to
day. The commissary clerks would fill these written orders, sending
the goods out on the first train.
In addition to buying and selling products for the benefit of the
canal workers, the commissary operated a number of manufacturing
establishments. It had a bakery using some 20,000 barrels of flour,
baking 6,000,000 loaves of bread and other things in proportion
annually; an ice-cream plant freezing 138,000 gallons of ice-cream
annually; a laundry washing 4,250,000 pieces a year; a coffee-roasting
plant; and a large cold-storage warehouse. About 70,000 people were
constantly supplied with commodities from the commissary.
In its efforts to meet the needs of the several classes of employees
on the Canal Zone the commission established four different kinds of
eating places,--a large general hotel, a score of line hotels,
Spanish messes, and West Indian laborers' kitchens. At Ancon it built
the large Tivoli Hotel costing half a million dollars, for the
accommodation of visitors; and of those high-class employees who
desired modern hotel facilities. This hotel is the social center of
the Canal Zone. Here practically all of the tourists come and stay
while on the Isthmus.
During the year 1912 this hotel cleared $53,000 in its operations. The
cost of the supplies for the meals served, of which there were
161,000, was approximately 51 cents per meal. The cost of services was
approximately 19 cents, making a total of 70 cents per meal. The rates
were $3 up to $5.50 a day, employees being given special concessions.
[Illustration: JOHN BURKE
MEAL TIME AT AN I. C. C. KITCHEN]
[Illustration: WASHINGTON HOTEL, COLON
MAJOR EUGENE T. WILSON
THE TIVOLI HOTEL, ANCON]
The line hotels were, more properly speaking, merely dining-rooms
where the American employees were furnished substantial meals for 30
cents each. Outsiders paid 50 cents each for these meals. They were up
to a very high standard. Once the late Senator Thomas H. Carter, of
Montana, was a member of a Senate committee visiting the Isthmus and
he invited the subsistence officer, Maj. Wilson, to come to Washington
and show the manager of the Senate restaurant how to prepare a good
meal. A year later, after Senator Albert B. Cummins, of Iowa, had
eaten one of the lunches at Gatun, he renewed the invitation of
Senator Carter, telling Maj. Wilson he was sure that if he were to
come Senators would get better meals for their money. At one of the
Congressional hearings on the Isthmus Representative T. W. Sims, of
Tennessee, asked that the menu of a meal he had eaten at one of these
hotels be inserted in the record. Major Wilson inserted the menu for
several days instead. The following is the menu at the Cristobal Hotel
for January 20, 1912:
Breakfast.--Oranges, sliced bananas, oatmeal, eggs to order, German
potatoes, ham or bacon, hot cakes, maple sirup, tea, coffee, cocoa.
Lunch.--Vegetable soup, fried pork chops, apple sauce, boiled
potatoes, pork and beans, sliced buttered beets, stewed cranberries,
creamed parsnips, lemon meringue pie, tea, coffee, cocoa.
Dinner.--Consomme vermicelli, beefsteak, natural gravy, lyonnaise
potatoes, stewed beans, sliced beets, stewed apples, carrots a la
Julienne, hot biscuits, ice-cream, chocolate cake, tea, coffee, cocoa.
The line hotels in 1912, which were operated at a loss of $12,000,
served over 2,000,000 meals. The cost of the supplies per meal
amounted to $0.2504 and the service to $0.0165, making the average
meal cost $0.3065, while the employees were charged 30 cents.
Approximately 2,000 Americans were continuous patrons of the line
hotels.
The messes for European laborers were operated in 1912 at a total cost
of $405,000. The returns from their operations amounted to $443,000,
showing a net profit of $38,000 on 1,108,000 rations. The net profit
per day's ration approximated 3-1/2 cents. The supplies entering into
the ration cost $0.3106 and the service of preparing it $0.0547.
The national diet for Europeans would appear very monotonous to
Americans. For the Spaniards who constituted the major portion of the
European employees, it was a "rancho," which is a mixture of stewed
meat, potatoes, cabbage, tomatoes and garbanzos heavily flavored with
Spanish sweet pepper. Their soups were made very stiff, really a meal
in themselves, since they were about the consistency of Irish stew
mashed up. A day's ration for Spanish laborers ran about as follows:
Breakfast.--Roast beef, pork sausage, corned-beef, sardines or bacon,
one-half loaf of bread, chocolate and milk.
Dinner.--Garbanzos or macaroni, roast beef or hamburger steak, fried
potatoes, oranges or bananas, one-half loaf of bread, coffee.
Supper.--Rice soup, peas or beans, rancho, one-quarter loaf of bread,
tea.
The Government charged the European laborers 40 cents a day for their
meals. Their mess halls were large, airy, comfortable and
conspicuously clean. The European laborers nearly all patronized these
mess halls; about 3,200 of them constantly were fed at these places.
Wherever there was a West Indian negro settlement along the line of
the canal the commission operated a mess kitchen. These kitchens were
kept scrupulously clean and the laborers were furnished meals at 9
cents each. Each laborer who patronized the kitchen had his little kit
into which the attendants put his meal, and he could carry it anywhere
he desired to eat it. In spite of the fact that these meals
corresponded almost exactly to the American Regular Army field
rations, they were never popular with the West Indian negroes.
Although there were some 25,000 of these laborers on the canal in
1912, only a little more than a half million rations were issued to
them during the year. Less than 15 per cent of the negro force
patronized the commission kitchen.
The following is a specimen day's ration in a West Indian kitchen:
Breakfast.--Cocoa and milk, porridge, bread, jam.
Dinner.--Pea soup, beef, doughboys, rice, bread, bananas.
Supper.--Stewed beef, boiled potatoes, stewed navy beans, bread, tea.
During the construction period of the canal the average American
received approximately $150 a month for his labor. Those who were
married and remained in the service a reasonable time were provided,
rent free, with family quarters. Their light bills were never
rendered, the coal for their kitchen stoves cost them nothing, and the
iceman never came around to collect. The bachelors were provided with
bachelor quarters with the necessary furniture for making them
comfortable. The average married quarters cost from $1,200 to $1,800
each, and the average quarters for a bachelor about $500 to construct.
The higher officials had separate houses; lesser officials were
furnished with semi-detached houses. The majority of the rank and file
of American married employees were housed in roomy, four-flat houses.
The verandas were broad and screened in with the best copper netting,
and all quarters were provided with necessary furniture at Government
expense.
The assignment of quarters and furniture called for a great deal of
diplomacy on the part of the quartermaster's department, since, if
Mrs. Jones happened to visit Mrs. Smith, and found that she had a
swell-front dresser in her bedroom, while her own was a straight-front
dresser, an irate lady was very shortly calling on the district
quartermaster and demanding to know why such discrimination should be
practiced. Perhaps she had been on the Canal Zone longer than Mrs.
Smith, and felt that if anyone were entitled to the swell-front
dresser she was the one. The district quartermaster had to explain
with all the patience at his command that it was not a case of
discrimination but merely that the commission had bought swell-front
dressers at a later date for the same price that it formerly had paid
for the straight-front ones, and that consequently the people who
furnished houses later got them.
On another occasion Mrs. Brown, calling on Mrs. White, found that Mrs.
White had an electric light on her side porch. She immediately fared
forth to pull the hair of the quartermaster for this discrimination,
but was somewhat taken back when that official calmly informed her
that the light had been put there for a few days in anticipation of a
children's party that was to be given by Mrs. White one night that
week.
The marvelous success of the commissary, not only in affording its
patrons better service at lower prices, but also in making a
substantial profit on the undertaking, had been referred to as the
most valuable lesson taught by the whole canal digging operation. It
has proved the efficiency of government agencies in fields far removed
from the ordinary operations of government, and it may be that its
experience will be used to advantage in combating the high cost of
living in the United States itself.