[Gandy dancers pushing ballast underneath tracks of the Tela Railroad Co., Honduras] – Historic Reproduction
![[Gandy dancers pushing ballast underneath tracks of the Tela Railroad Co., Honduras], 1948 Oct. — historic photograph](https://images.jameslantos.com/img/3a/3a7f2baf092e-L.webp)
(Originally scanned by the Library of Congress. Each image is professionally and digitally cleaned of artifacts such as color bars and extra borders prior to printing.)
Description
[Gandy dancers pushing ballast underneath tracks of the Tela Railroad Co., Honduras] comes to life in this historic photograph, reproduced from the original with every detail intact. The original is held by the Library of Congress, so what you hang is a true record of its time.
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[Gandy dancers pushing ballast underneath tracks of the Tela Railroad Co., Honduras]
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Two workers known as gandy dancers, the track crews who tamped the roadbed by hand, pack crushed stone ballast beneath the ties of the Tela Railroad Company in Honduras. The line was a subsidiary of the United Fruit Company and carried bananas from plantations on the north coast to the port of Tela. Keeping the track level and solid was constant work in the tropical lowlands, where rain and humidity wore down the roadbed. The photograph ran in Unifruitco, the company's magazine, in October 1948, a reminder of how the firm presented its own labor force to employees and readers.
| Created / published | 1948 Oct. |
|---|---|
| Medium | 1 photographic print. |
| Genre | Photographic prints 1940-1950. |
| Notes | No. 2943. Published in: Unifruitco, Oct. 1948, p. 20. |
| Subjects | Tela Railroad Company--People--1940-1950. Railroad employees--1940-1950. Laborers--Honduras--1940-1950. Railroad construction & maintenance--1940-1950. |
| Source | Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division |
| Original scan | 3,265 × 4,096 px · prints to 11 × 14 in at 300 dpi |
| Reference | AMZ-SOTP-HPA-181894 |
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