Mexican Contract Laborers Came, Worked and Settled

 

The Santa Fe first brought Mexican contract laborers to Fort Madison in 1906 to help convert the 30-mile stretch of the main rail line between Niota and Strongurst, Illinois, from single to double tracks. 

 

The Hispanic workers arrived in the early spring, stayed in bunk rail cars, parked on sidings near the Santa Fe coal chutes at Shopton, and returned to Mexico in late autumn before cold weather set in. 

 

At the time, wages for section gang laborers were $1.15 for a nine-hour day, or about 13 cents an hour.

In 1907, several Mexican section hands engaged to work on the double rail line project struck for a wage increase of 25 cents a day. The Santa Fe refused the wage increase and also refused to transport the striking laborers back to Mexico without charge, claiming that the men had broken their agreed contracts.

 

By 1911, however, when the double-line track had been completed to Chicago, and nearly 100 Hispanic workers a year were employed at Fort Madison on contract, basic wages did rise to $1.51 per day.

 

El Cometa

 

Over the years, increasing numbers of Mexican Laborers who came to Fort Madison on contract with Santa Fe brought their families. Some early arrivals built shacks between and below what is now 29th to 33rd Street on the Santa Fe land.

 

This makeshift settlement, called El Cometa (the neighborhood) by its residents, gradually expanded over the years as Santa Fe continued to use Mexican labor for track work, especially in 1914 in the raising of the entire Shopton rail car switching yards by three feet. The project to raise the switch yards became necessary because of a three-foot rise in the levee of the Mississippi River at Fort Madison, brought about by the completion of the Keokuk dam the previous year.

 

By 1916, as the Mexican government engaged in civil strife with rebel groups within Mexico, many Hispanic Santa Fe workers in Fort Madison were drafted into the Mexican Army and had to return home. At the time, some 200 Hispanics worked on contract at the local rail yards, but others had settled permanently in Fort Madison and were employed year-round by Santa Fe. 

 

50 to a Bunk Car 

 

Santa Fe sought to raise the switch tracks at Shopton another 17 inches in 1917. To accomplish this, the railroad transported large numbers of Mexican laborers from El Paso, Texas, in bunk cars that often held 50 men. When the workers arrived in Fort Madison, after being crowded in transit, they were immediately deloused and put to work.

 

In the spring of 1918, most Hispanic workers refused to return to Fort Madison unless their wages were increased by 25 cents a day. At that time, an acute labor shortage existed for Santa Fe as local railroad employees had either enlisted or were drafted into the armed forces to serve during WWI, which the U.S. had entered in 1917.

 

Accordingly, the Hispanic workers received their 25-cent wage increase, came north, and alleviated the local Santa Fe labor shortage. 

 

Life in the Tents 

 

In 1918, many contract Mexican workers lived locally in tents pitched near the Santa Fe coal chutes. These temporary accommodations were arranged because a major fire the previous summer had destroyed most of the bunk cars that usually housed Hispanic workers. 

 

A subsequent fire in 1919 that consumed four additional bunk cars brought more urgently to the notice of Sante Fe officials that bunk car housing was substandard and dangerous. Thus, in 1921 and 1922, the four tile block buildings at the foot of 35th Street were constructed to house the Hispanic rail-line maintenance employees, who named the area La Istafiate (White Sagebrush).

 

Improved Housing

 

Although the bunkhouses marked an improvement over previous local housing provided by Santa Fe for Hispanic workers, each unit accommodated 20 or more people and had just one outdoor privy. Moreover, the only water source for all residents of the four units was several outside standpipes, from which water had to be fetched by hand in all weather.

 

The bunkhouses formed a kind of seasonal residence for temporary Mexican rail workers and a temporary home for Mexican-Americans who Santa Fe permanently employed in Fort Madison until they could move to local homes they might acquire.

 

During WWII, with 12,000 Santa Fe employees, including several Mexican Americans from Fort Madison, in military service, the railroad brought more work up from Mexico. Some recruits came to Fort Madison and stayed in bunkhouses but eventually found better private housing. The last bunkhouse was demolished in 1979, and the entire area is now overgrown in weeds.