Brotherhood of Railway Carmen
Early emblem of the Brotherhood Railway Carmen of America, dating back to the 19th Century.
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| Merged into | Transportation Communications International Union |
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| Formation | September 9, 1890 |
| Founded at | Topeka, Kansas |
| Extinction | 1986 |
| Merger of | Carmen's Mutual Aid Association and Brotherhood of Railway Car Repairers of North America |
| Purpose | Fraternal benefit society and trade union for railroad employees involved in the repair and inspection of railroad cars. |
The Brotherhood Railway Carmen of America, commonly known as the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen (BRC), was a fraternal benefit society and trade union established in the United States of America. The BRC united railroad employees involved in the repair and inspection of railroad cars to advance their common interests in the realm of hours of work, wages, and working conditions.
The organization traces its genesis to a seven-member group called the Brotherhood of Railway Car Repairers of North America founded late in October 1888 in a railway car in Iowa. This group merged with a rival organization, the Carmen's Mutual Aid Association at a "Joint Convention" held in Topeka, Kansas in September 1890, formally establishing the organization and its bylaws and electing its officers under the new permanent name.
The BRC was disestablished through merger into the Transportation Communications International Union (TCU) in 1986, which was in turn amalgamated into the International Association of Machinists (IAM) in a merger completed in 2012.
One of the largest industries of the 19th century in the United States revolved around the nation's rapidly growing network of railways — transportation lines which moved millions of passengers and billions of dollars in raw and finished products from place to place. Workers in the industry frequently suffered from low pay, long hours of labor, job insecurity, and dangerous working conditions. Prior to the end of the 1870s, little existed in the way of collective organization of railway workers, with only the elite railway conductors and railroad engineers organized to any significant extent, and these on a strictly defined craft basis.
Other less skilled crafts were slower to organize, led by the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen (B of LF) in December 1873. Those who repaired and inspected railroad cars were left to their own devices and suffered accordingly, with wages for car repairers running from 10 cents to 15 cents per hours and salaries of car inspectors topping out at a paltry $45 per month. Moreover, even these low wages were insecure, with car repair shops typically placed under the supervision of a master mechanic and foremen working for him, who capriciously hired and fired at will and sometimes extorted gifts from workers to maintain the supervisor's good will.
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