Citizen Hobo: How a Century of Homelessness Shaped America.(Book Review)

Citizen Hobo: How a Century of Homelessness Shaped America. Todd DePastino. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.

In the post-Civil War period of economic and technological expansion, the United States found itself in a state of volatile transition. The rise of large-scale enterprise, mechanical advancements, and urban development irreversibly altered the nation's physical, social, and cultural landscape. Out of this industrial maelstrom, the American hobo emerged as an iconoclastic reminder of the underside of the Gilded Age (1865-90), redefining traditional notions of work, home, and citizenship.

In this engaging exploration of the rise and fall of the hobo phenomenon, Todd DePastino, a professor of history at Waynesburg College, considers homelessness more as a category of culture than of economics, and tells the complex story of how a "great army of tramps" forged its own counterculture in a time of economic and social upheaval. Rejecting or abandoning the Lincolnian ideal of the independent homestead, hordes of Civil War veterans and migratory workers took to the road not only as a matter of economic necessity but also in deliberate rebellion against the constraints of traditional roles and expectations.

While the mass nonconformism of migratory workers alarmed public officials and raised questions about the direction of nationhood, hobohemia flourished as a vibrant expression of poverty and disenfranchisement from traditional norms and values. Alienated from established communities and discarded by employers when they were no longer needed, hoboes forged their own system of self-preservation and mutual assistance, congregating in railroad "jungles" in which they created a more abstract sense of home and belonging. Here, and in the urban neighborhoods of the "Main Stem," a masculine working-class counterculture allowed migratory workers to retain a sense of community and status without the traditional restraints of a wife, family, and permanent residence.

Periodically reunited in these metropolitan centers, migratory workers cultivated a distinct and irresistible social and commercial environment. Despite poverty and erratic employment, ...