21. Pullman
George Pullman used the transportation industry to create a new type of railcar, the Pullman Sleeper, soon known worldwide simply as Pullmans. He also created an entirely new profession – the Pullman Porter – and eventually a town to house and feed the workers at his plant, where his cars were built. Pullman used the Erie Canal packet boats he observed in his youth as the basis for his sleeping cars, which offered comfortable beds, privacy, and elite service from the porters assigned to each car. Pullman hired mostly black males as his porters, and they became a staple in American entertainment and culture for decades, lauded for their superior service.
To house his workers he created one of the first company towns in the United States, where they paid rent to his company, shopped at company stores, and enjoyed company provided entertainment. The town was at first praised for its treatment of its residents, before later economic downturns led Pullman to cut wages without cutting rents and prices in the company store. The 1894 Pullman Strike which followed left the company in disrepute with the rising power of organized labor. Chicago annexed the community as part of a general annexation of several South Side communities. Pullman Sleeper cars, manned with porters, remained in operation into the 1980s, though the company collapsed in 1968.