Blog
![The Blue Wound](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/thebluewound_345x@2x.jpg?v=1488598821)
The Blue Wound
“Boys caught in freight yards were summarily beaten by notorious railroad bulls like Texas Slim, who ruled the yards at Longview, Texas. Denver B...
![Tiger Weeds](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/tigerweeds_345x@2x.jpg?v=1488473269)
Tiger Weeds
In almost all of the hobo lore I’ve read, plants are a prominent theme. Plants that are edible. Plants that are poisonous. Plants that get yo...
![Coal City Cockfighter](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/coalcitycockfighter_345x@2x.jpg?v=1488427421)
Coal City Cockfighter
In the 1974 Monte Hellman film, Cockfighter, the late, great Warren Oates plays a miserable sonofabitch named Frank Mansfield who, in the film’s...
![Hudson King](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/hudsonking1_345x@2x.jpg?v=1488302134)
Hudson King
There was no shortage of hobos in New York City during The Depression. Along the Hudson River, there were were hobo jungles almost the full len...
![The Orange Beast](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/theorangebeast_345x@2x.jpg?v=1488254538)
The Orange Beast
"A train is not a man, and a man is not a train. . .”
George Milburn, The Hobo’s Hornbook
Hey–
To live outdoors during The Depression was to h...
![Sister of the Road](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/sisteroftheroad_345x@2x.jpg?v=1488056864)
Sister of the Road
Nobody knows if there was such a person as “Boxcar Bertha.” Dr. Ben Reitman wrote her “as told to” memoir in 1937 and the feeling is that she w...
![The Last Ride](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/hobo10_345x@2x.jpg?v=1487877515)
The Last Ride
Hey–
In George Milburn’s, The Hobo’s Hornbook, a 1930 collection of hobo balladry and poems and songs, he draws a distinction between hobos and ...
![The Road Hawk](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/getofftherails_345x@2x.jpg?v=1487831509)
The Road Hawk
Hey–
In Timothy Egan’s, The Worst Hard Time, a riveting account of the horrors of the dustbowl and The Great Depression, dust storms are rendere...
![The Red Road](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/religiouspeople_345x@2x.jpg?v=1487716664)
The Red Road
Hey–
I elected not to go to the art fairs in New York this week. I actually haven’t been going to them for a while now and I don’t miss them. ...
![The Hobo King](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/thehoboking_345x@2x.jpg?v=1487715806)
The Hobo King
Hey–
I had an odd experience the other day. I had accepted an invitation to be a speaker at the SEA (Self-Employment in the Arts) conference out...
![Poem for a Redhead](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/redheads_345x@2x.jpg?v=1487539088)
Poem for a Redhead
Hey–
In a lot of hobo literature, there is not much mention of women or romance–one suspects that hobos didn’t get much pussy, being smelly and b...
![The Quiet Dust](http://tonyfitzpatrick.co/cdn/shop/articles/hobo09_345x@2x.jpg?v=1487385318)
The Quiet Dust
“They scraped and planted and prayed and saved. . .then the black blizzards would come and take it all away. . .and the banks moved in like vultur...