The Union Transportation Company of Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville’s African-American reaction to segregation on public transport.
Above: A picture that is widely credited as being of The Union Transportation Company. I have been unable to verify.
Last year, while researching my short work “Early Tennessee Automobile Manufacturers”, I kept coming across articles in the Horseless Age about a company in Nashville, Tennessee called, The Union Transportation Company. The first entry is here:
On January 10th, 1905 a Davidson County Representative named Charles P. Fahey, presented Bill No. 87. The legislation intended to segregate streetcars. After the bill passed the House by a margin of 81 to 4, it was sent to the Senate, which passed 28 to 1.
It only took until March 30th, 1905 for the bill to be signed into law. It mandated all operating streetcars have signs clearly separating the “white” and “black” sections of cars. It also set a fine of up to $25 for anyone who refused to comply with the system. The law was to come into effect on July 5, 1905.
Prominent leaders within Nashville’s African American community called for a boycott. Reverend J.A. Jones of the St. Paul AME Church reportedly reckoned that 90% of Nashville’s African-American population wouldn’t ride city streetcars. A weekly newspaper, The Nashville Clarion, suggested the city's black population should buy buggies or walk if they could not afford transportation.
When the new law took effect, the Nashville Transit Company, lost hundreds of fairs per day. The Nashville Streetcar Boycott was one of the largest transportation protests in the 20th Century and would act as a precursor to the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955-1956.
This is the reason for the formation of the Union Transportation Company. In later issues, the progress of the company is followed. The second entry about the company:
It is clear that the company had very high hopes of success from the above article, but it seems as though the steam cars they purchased were just too worn out and the company had to replace them. The third mention:
President Taylor was local African American businessman Preston Taylor. The capitalization of the company was initially $25,000, in $10 shares. The change from steam buses to electric was precipitated for two apparent reasons. Firstly, the used buses were in bad mechanical condition and the machines found the steep Nashville roads difficult to climb. I’m sure they found the steep grades difficult to go down safely as well.
The fourth mention of the company seems to indicate everything is going fine by late December 1905:
However, we find out that the company had problems charging their buses. The fifth mention:
The competition the article describes is the Nashville Railway and Light Company. An article published on Blackpast.org states that a number of the bus's batteries were intentionally overcharged and damaged while at the Nashville Railway and Light Company. After this costly episode, the company installed its own charging equipment in the Nashville Baptist Publishing House.
But by June, and the last mention in the Horseless Age, the company was gone:
It seems that the expense the company incurred by having to purchase buses, on two different occasions and finally build its own power plant was too much. Also, the sentiment in the town seems to have changed and the novelty of the idea had worn off by the Summer of 1906.
References other than the Horseless Age:
