RE: AFL/CIO & American civil rights history. Rosa Parks was '56. By the time Steve Goodman put pen to paper in 1970 the many and universally 'whites only' American railroad union memberships had voted to integrate. With the notable exception of the lone 'blacks only' union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (aka 'Pullmans') who chose instead to disband and merge with the previously integrated Brotherhood Railway Carmen of America (BRCA) when Amtrak reorganized itself and killed off The City of New Orleans route, among others.

And yes, you are reading your colour charts correctly. It had really sucked to be brown, yellow, red, indeterminate or purple polka dotted and wanting to work on the railroad for a living.

By 1970 American freight yards were sterile, lifeless, robotic, remote-controlled no-man-lands. The laid off/out-of-work black porters, of which there were many, would be at the union hall, or beer joint, downtown.

Steve Goodman wrote a popular song… not American history.