Malcolm X spent time on the railroads as a youth selling sandwiches and washing dishes, but lasted only about a day with Pullman. He undoubtedly found Pullman’s well-padded rule book and demand for obsequious service intolerable. But while he was there, the revolutionary observed, “We were in that world of Negroes who were both servants and psychologists, aware that white people are so obsessed with their own importance that they will pay liberally, even dearly, for the impression of being catered to and entertained.”
