Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, the Order of Railway Conductors,
the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, the Brotherhood of Railroad
Trainmen, the Order of Railroad Telegraphers, the Switchmen's Union of
North America, and the International Brotherhood of Maintenance-of-Way
Employees and the National Association of Letter Carriers.

The oldest of these organizations, the Engineers, was formed at Detroit,
August 17, 1863, as the "Brotherhood of the Footboard," and was
reorganized at Indianapolis, Indiana, August 17, 1864, under the present
name. Under the original constitution, foremen and machinists as well as
engineers were admitted; but since February 23, 1864, membership has
been restricted to locomotive engineers.[11] The Brotherhood was
prosperous from the outset, and at the twenty-first convention in 1884
Grand Chief Arthur reported 258 subordinate divisions with 16,000
members; at the sixth biennial session in May, 1904, Grand Chief Stone
reported 652 divisions with 46,400 members.

[Footnote 11: Locomotive Engineers' Journal, February, 1867.]

The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers is not only the oldest of the
railway unions, but was the first to institute national beneficiary
features. Three years after its organization, in September, 1866, the
grand division levied an assessment to raise a fund for "widows and
orphans and totally disabled members." The law was unsatisfactory, and
few subordinate divisions paid the assessments prior to the Cincinnati
convention of October, 1867. This convention ordered all assessments
paid at once, and on December 2, 1867, $1212.40 was paid over to the
chairman of the board of trustees. This was the nucleus of a fund which
reached $10,787.63 on March 1, 1871. On account of charges of
mismanagement and the slow growth of the fund repeated efforts were made