hobos
Bindle-carrying wanderers
Hobos are itinerant workers or homeless wanderers, especially those who travel by freight train.
The term emerged in late 19th-century America and carries a distinct connotation: unlike tramps or bums, hobos traditionally were willing to work.
Hobos gathered in camps near the railroad yards.
The singular is hobo.
Temporary, soon departing
- wandererRootless, roving person
- drifterAimless, rootless traveler
- vagrantHomeless itinerant person
- nomadHomeless wanderer by choice
itinerant · homeless · boxcar · bindle · jungle · camp · freight · rails
Thirties prairie ecological collapse
- 1930sFourth decade, twentieth century
- railroadPermanent track for trains
- symbolsMarks conveying meaning
- marksVisible signs or grades
Woody Guthrie · jungles · harvest · migrant labor · riding rails · Great Depression · unemployment · breadlines
Seeking wild food sources
- scavengingGathering discarded or dead material
- odd jobsSmall miscellaneous tasks
- day laborTemporary unskilled employment
- beggingEarnest desperate requesting
dumpster diving · makeshift · campfire · cooking · resourcefulness · self-reliance · sleeping rough · warming
- folkloreInherited cultural narratives
- romanticizedMade more appealing than reality
- freedomAbsence of constraint
- countercultureRejection of mainstream values
Beat Generation · Kerouac · wanderlust · outsider · antiestablishment · bohemian · folk music · storytelling
transient
Temporary, soon departing
nomad · itinerant · homeless · boxcar · bindle · jungle · camp · freight · rails · roaming
Dust Bowl
Thirties prairie ecological collapse
- 1930sFourth decade, twentieth century
- railroadPermanent track for trains
- symbolsMarks conveying meaning
Woody Guthrie · marks · jungles · harvest · migrant labor · riding rails · Great Depression · unemployment · breadlines · seasonal work
foraging
Seeking wild food sources
- scavengingGathering discarded or dead material
- odd jobsSmall miscellaneous tasks
- day laborTemporary unskilled employment
begging · dumpster diving · makeshift · campfire · cooking · resourcefulness · self-reliance · sleeping rough · warming · sheltering
Charlie Chaplin
- folkloreInherited cultural narratives
- romanticizedMade more appealing than reality
- freedomAbsence of constraint
counterculture · Beat Generation · Kerouac · wanderlust · outsider · antiestablishment · bohemian · folk music · storytelling · nicknames
- underclasspoor, pauper, peasant, homeless, serf
- slackersslackers, loafers, idlers, idler, layabouts
- Railroad Historyrailroad barons, railroad workers, rail workers, conductors, firemen
- povertypoverty line, poor, poverty rate, impoverished, generational poverty
- nomadsnomad, nomadism, Bedouin, wanderer, roaming
- outcastsoutcast, pariah, pariahs, outcasts, outlaws
hoboshomeowners
Property-possessing residents
householders · permanent residents · homebodies · suburbanites · locals
hobosmillionaires
People worth seven figures
the rich · aristocrats · tycoons · magnates · the elite
hoboswhite-collar workers
Salaried professional employees
nine-to-fivers · salaried employees · wage earners · working stiffs · professionals
- hobo bagCrescent-shaped soft purse
- hobo stewTransient's improvised potage
- boxcar hobo
- hobo clownComedic vagrant character type
- hobo stoveCan converted for cooking
- hobo jungleHomeless encampment near railways