Porter Talk: Episode 3 trailer

Green stylized railway porter whistle with Library and Archives Canada maple leaf motif leading to a badge, and rays rising up to the top. 

Discover Library and Archives Canada presents “Porter Talk.” This mini-series explores the lived experiences of Black men who laboured as porters for both the Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railways during the twentieth century.

Stanley G. Grizzle, a Canadian Pacific Railway porter for twenty years as well as a celebrated activist, civil servant, and citizenship judge, was also an avid historian who went to great lengths to document and preserve Black History in Canada and beyond. His collection is now held at Library and Archives Canada. Join us as we delve into the dire working conditions porters experienced as they traversed the country aboard the hotel on wheels. (Episode 3 trailer)

Duration: 0:53

File size: 1.22 MB Download MP3

Publish Date: December 5, 2024

  • Transcript of Porter Talk episode 3 trailer

    Coming up in the third episode of “Porter Talk,” we’ll delve into the dire working conditions porters experienced as they traversed the country aboard the hotel on wheels.

    Stanley G. Grizzle (SG): How many hours a month did you work before the union?

    Roy Williams (RW): … [T]he hours wasn’t counted, we just worked that’s all, uh, a twenty-four-hour day was, um-

    SG: Mm-hmm.

    RW: -when we were on-on duty, why-we could be called on any-any hour. There was no-there was no time limit. Full-time day.

    Melvin Crump (MC): Even if you were practically asleep on your feet walking through your car checking and testing, you were half asleep doing this, but there was not too much that, uh, you could do about that, because that was part of your duties and part of your job.

    Episode 3 – “All Aboard the Hotel on Wheels” will be released in December. You can subscribe for free to Discover Library and Archives Canada wherever you get your podcasts!

Host: Richard Provencher, Chief, Media Relations, Communications and Policy Branch

Featuring: Melvin Crump, Stanley G. Grizzle, and Roy Williams

Voiceover for the French version of this podcast trailer: Roldson Dieudonné and Lerntz Joseph

Narrator biographies

Interviewer

Stanley G. Grizzle, the eldest of seven children, was born in Toronto in 1918. His parents, both of whom immigrated from Jamaica in 1911, worked in the service sector: his mother as a domestic servant and his father as a chef for the Grand Trunk Railway. Poverty and a lack of opportunities led Grizzle to the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) in 1940, where he began a 20-year career as a sleeping car porter. In 1942, he was conscripted by the Canadian Government, attaining corporal status while he served as a medic in Holland. In 1962, Grizzle left the CPR and became the first Black Canadian to be employed by the Ontario Ministry of Labour. He ran unsuccessfully for the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation before being appointed by Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau as a judge in the court of Canadian citizenship in 1978. A devoted activist, Grizzle campaigned tirelessly for reforms in Canadian labour, immigration, and human rights policies. He was also an avid historian dedicated to documenting and preserving Black History in Canada. His collection is held at Library and Archives Canada.

Narrators

Melvin Crump was born in Edmonton in 1916 to a family that immigrated to Keystone, Alberta, from Oklahoma in 1911 under the Homestead Act. Uninterested in farming, he became a CPR sleeping car porter in 1936, at the height of the Great Depression. He worked out of the Calgary Division until 1954, where he served as chairman of the BSCP Safety Committee. (Source: 417403)

Roy Williams was born in 1903 in Waco, Texas. His large family, which included twelve children, immigrated to Canada in stages. Williams himself came in 1910 as part of the Black Migration movement, settling with his family members in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, before moving to a homestead in Hillside. Seasonal jobs in construction and farming occupied his youth until the job crisis caused by the Depression led him to Winnipeg in 1936 to work as a sleeping car porter for the CPR. One year later, the company transferred Williams to Calgary, where he remained on the job 32 more years. Williams played an integral role in organizing the BSCP in Calgary and later served as Secretary-Treasurer of the union local for sixteen years. His wife, Cordie Williams, was also involved in the union movement, through her participation in the BSCP Ladies’ Auxiliary. (Source: 417402 [part 1]; 417389 [part 2])

Subscribe

Subscribe to automatically receive new episodes.

Contact the podcast team

Send your feedback to: bac.balados-podcasts.lac@canada.ca