I'm gonna possum belly on a cannonball to get the graybacks off my glad rags, but if I grease the track no doubt I'll catch the westbound!

I have a new fascination: The hobo. I don't mean that old guy who has been hanging out at the Montague Expy and Great Mall Pkwy intersection since before anybody can remember. In fact, he probably has the most stable, profitable job in the current economy. I'm talking about the freight-train-hopping, bindle-stick sporting, Great Depression era migrants.

I could go on and on about this mesmerizing subculture of the 1930's, but instead I am going to pique your interest with just a few highlights, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Hobo ethical code

An ethical code was created by Tourist Union #63 during its 1889 National Hobo Convention in St. Louis Missouri.^[4] This code was voted upon as a concrete set of laws to govern the Nation-wide Hobo Body, it reads this way;

1. Decide your own life, don't let another person run or rule you.
2. When in town, always respect the local law and officials, and try to be a gentleman at all times.
3. Don't take advantage of someone who is in a vulnerable situation, locals or other hobos.
4. Always try to find work, even if temporary, and always seek out jobs nobody wants. By doing so you not only help a business along, but ensure employme nt should you return to that town again.
5. When no employment is available, make your own work by using your added talents at crafts.
6. Do not allow yourself to become a stupid drunk and set a bad example for locals treatment of other hobos.
7. When jungling in town, respect handouts, do not wear them out, another hobo will be coming along who will need them as bad, if not worse than you.
8. Always respect nature, do not leave garbage where you are jungling.
9. If in a community jungle, always pitch in and help.
10. Try to stay clean, and boil up wherever possible.
11. When traveling, ride your train respectfully, take no personal chances, cause no problems with the operating crew or host railroad, act like an extra crew member.
12. Do not cause problems in a train yard, another hobo will be coming along who will need passage through that yard.
13. Do not allow other hobos to molest children, expose to authorities all molesters, they are the worst garbage to infest any society.
14. Help all runaway children, and try to induce them to return home.
15. Help your fellow hobos whenever and wherever needed, you may need their help someday.

Hobo lingo in use up to the 1940s

• Accommodation car - The caboose of a train
• Angellina - young inexperienced kid
• Bad Road - A train line rendered useless by some hobo's bad action
• Banjo - (1) A small portable frying pan. (2) A short, "D" handled shovel
• Barnacle - a person who sticks to one job a year or more
• Beachcomber - a hobo that hangs around docks or seaports
• Big House - Prison
• Bindle stick - Collection of belongings wrapped in cloth and tied around a stick
• Bindlestiff - A hobo who steals from other hobos.
• Blowed-in-the-glass - a genuine, trustworthy individual
• "'Bo" - the common way one hobo referred to another: "I met that 'Bo on the way to Bangor last spring".
• Boil Up - Specifically, to boil one's clothes to kill lice and their eggs. Generally, to get oneself as clean as possible
• Bone polisher - A mean dog
• Bone orchard - a graveyard
• Bull - A railroad officer
• Bullets - Beans
• Buck - a Catholic priest good for a dollar
• Buger - Today's lunch
• C, H, and D - indicates an individual is Cold, Hungry, and Dry (thirsty)
• California Blankets - Newspapers, intended to be used for bedding
• Calling In - Using another's campfire to warm up or cook
• Cannonball - A fast train
• Carrying the Banner - Keeping in constant motion so as to avoid bein g picked up for loitering or to keep from freezing
• Catch the Westbound - to die
• Chuck a dummy - Pretend to faint
• Cover with the moon - Sleep out in the open
• Cow crate - A railroad stock car
• Crumbs - Lice
• Doggin' it - Traveling by bus, especially on the Greyhound bus line
• Easy mark - A hobo sign or mark that identifies a person or place where one can get food and a place to stay overnight
• Elevated - under the influence of drugs or alcohol
• Flip - to board a moving train
• Flop - a place to sleep, by extension: "Flophouse", a cheap hotel.
• Glad Rags - One's best clothes
• Graybacks - Lice
• Grease the Track - to be run over by a train
• Gump - a scrap of meat
• Honey dipping - Working with a shovel in the sewer
• Hot - (1) A fugitive hobo. (2) A decent meal: "I could use three hots and a flop."
• Hot Shot - train with priority freight, stops rarely, goes faster. synonym for "Cannonball"
• Jungle - An area off a railroad where hobos camp and congregate
• Jungle Buzzard - a hobo or tramp that preys on their own
• Knowledge bus - A school bus used for shelter
• Main Drag - the busiest road in a town
• Moniker / Monica - A nickname
• Mulligan - a type of community stew, created by several hobos combining whatever food they have or can collect
• Nickel note - five-dollar bill
• On The Fly - jumping a moving train
• Padding the hoof - to travel by foot
• Possum Belly - to ride on the roof of a passenger car. One must lie flat, on his/her stomach, to not be blown off
• Pullman - a rail car
• Punk - any young kid
• Reefer - A compression of "refrigerator car".
• Road kid - A young hobo who apprentices himself to an older hobo in order to learn the ways of the road
• Road stake - the small amount of money a hobo may have in case of an emergency
• Rum dum - A drunkard
• Sky pilot - a preacher or minister
• Soup bowl- A place to get soup, bread and drinks
• Snipes - Cigarette butts "sniped" (eg. in ashtrays)
• Spear biscuits - Looking for food in garbage cans
• Stemming - panhandling or mooching along the streets
• Tokay Blanket - drinking alcohol to stay warm
• Yegg - A traveling professional thief

Here is my personal favorite, Hobo Signs:
Isn't it interesting that the sign for a gentleman looks just like a grave? Could the hobo signage possibly be a wry reflection on the demise of the "good guy"? Interesting. Very interesting.

One last point of interest: The term "hobo" is not just a noun! Why, you may be asking, should I care about the linguistic structure of such a stodgy word? I am here and ready with answers! Apparently, "hobo" is a verb as well! As in, "I hoboed," "He hoboed," or as Wikipedia says "Notable people who have hoboed." By knowing that "hobo" is a verb as well as a noun, you can gain friends and influence people in ways that you never dreamed possible. For example, when you are in your next job interview and they ask you "Why do you want this job?" you can answer with "Well Sir/Madam, I hoboed across the nation for the last 32 years and I am looking for a respectable way to barnacle" (see hobo lingo, above). With this kind of response, your potential employer will immediately thirst to become your current employer, guaranteed*. With "hobo" in your vocabulary as both a noun and a verb, you become the master of your own fate, throwing open the doors of possibility and letting in the sunshine of destiny.

That, my dear friend, is a somewhat-brief introduction to the finer points of the hobo lifestyle. May you absorb this knowledge and run wild, hopping fences and dodging law enforcement authorities until you reach the shores of the Ocean of Opportunity.