Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters Commemorative Plaque, 2017
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Resource ID
5251
Access
Open
Address
255 Bremner Boulevard, Toronto, ON M5V 3M9
Credit Line
Heritage Toronto
Date of Creation
2017
Historical Themes
Black Heritage, Labour History
Program Category
Historical Plaques
Rights
Heritage Toronto
Time Period
1835-1899, 1900-1953
Caption
Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters Commemorative Plaque, 2017
Description
Beginning in the 1880s, this site was, for almost 100 years, a large coach yard where sleeping car porters working for the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) prepared passenger cars for travel across Canada that could take up to four days and three nights. Black men were preferred for the job because of their long history in domestic service to whites. Porters working for Canadian railways came from Black communities in Canada, but were also recruited from the United States and the Caribbean.
Porters faced institutional racism in all aspects of their work: their pay was lower, they were barred from promotions to supervisory positions, and they were excluded from white railway workers’ unions. They began to organize, most successfully in 1939, by joining forces with the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (BSCP), an American union created in 1925.
On May 18, 1945, the BSCP became the first Black union in Canada to sign an agreement with its white employer, the CPR. Among other benefits, porters’ starting salaries increased, they received pay for downtime on the road, and, after 1955, they could be promoted to Sleeping Car Conductor.
The BCSP's organizing efforts and civil rights advocacy left a powerful legacy that influenced human rights policy and labour relations in Canada.
Marker lat / long: 43.641794, -79.386349 (WGS84)