You can travel in style, but eventually you have to pay the bill.

The world knows George Pullman as the inventor of the railroad sleeping car which is synonymous with his name.  It was the perfect idea for the time, when the American railroad system was expanding after the Civil War.  The Pullman car was literally a "hotel on wheels" which offered fine dining, elegant washrooms, and sleeping berths for middle-class passengers.  It also provided jobs for thousands of former slaves who had been freed during the War.

To meet the incredible demand for his product, Pullman invented something even more revolutionary: the first company town, outside of Chicago.  At the center was a giant factory, surrounded by worker housing, shopping areas, a recreation center, a library, and a church.  Pullman was praised for his benevolence.  But he also outlawed independent newspapers, public speeches or open discussion.  His workers lamented, "We are born in a Pullman house, fed from the Pullman shops, taught in the Pullman school, catechized in the Pullman Church, and when we die we shall go to the Pullman Hell."

In the summer of 1894, Pullman's reputation went off the rails.  The country had gone into a deep recession, and Pullman cut salaries 25% without lowering the rent his workers were forced to pay.  In response, his entire workforce - 50,000 people who built and serviced Pullman cars nationwide - went on strike, which threatened to shut down the country's postal delivery system.  In response, President Grover Cleveland sent in 12,000 federal troops to violently break the strike, a brutal move which left several workers dead.

The nation was shocked and appalled. The political damage to the President was severe.  Facing an election in the fall, he needed a way to save face and repair his relations with the labor movement.  Just six days after the strike ended, a bill passed unanimously through Congress, which Cleveland signed with much fanfare, declaring Sept. 3 a national day of rest.

The ploy didn't work. Cleveland was not re-elected. Pullman was forever branded as a greedy overlord; when he died three years later he was laid to rest in a lead casket under several tons of reinforced concrete to keep workers from desecrating his body.

But the legislation stuck. Since 1894, the first Monday in September has been recognized as "laborer's day." .

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