Reid's Express

DESCRIPTION: "You'll get on board of Reid's Express to travel the icy rail" to the station at Badger Brook and lumber "just like a slave... 'twill carry you to your grave." "When I gets home no more I'll roam and the lumbering woods I'll shun."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1958 (Peacock)
KEYWORDS: lumbering hardtimes logger
FOUND IN: Canada(Newf)
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Peacock, pp. 757-758, "Reid's Express" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #9800
RECORDINGS:
Everett Bennett, "Reid's Express" (on PeacockCDROM) [one verse only]
NOTES [182 words]: Badger Brook, later Badger, is not far from Bonavista Bay on the northeast coast of Newfoundland. - BS
The Reid Newfoundland Company built most of the Newfoundland Railway; hence the reference to Reid in the song title. For a bit more about the truly incredible bargain that put Robert Reid and his enterprise in charge of the Railway, see the notes to "The Wreck of the Steamship Ethie." For the hard times experienced by the men who worked on the railway, see "The Bonavist Line."
The claim that the workers earned $23 for three months' work is perhaps indicative. Peacock, dividing $23 by 13 weeks, comes up with $1.77 per week, or 25 cents per day. In fact (see again the notes on "The Bonavist Line") their normal pay was $1 per day, which presumably means $6 per week (since they would have Sundays, but probably not Saturdays, off) -- but $2.50 per week was deducted for their lodging, leaving $3.50 per week. Which happens to be almost exactly twice $1.77. So the workers in this song were being paid half the amount paid the railroad workers. This probably tells us something. - RBW
Last updated in version 5.0
File: Pea757

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