Hustler of freight, self-proclaimed philosopher, aspiring freight historian, veteran (some call me Doc).
Cincinnati, OH
Joined April 2017
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Chameleon carriers, rigged leases and worn-out trucks were in the federal record long before 1980.
Here is the freight side of how Newport paid for Las Vegas:
Moe Dalitz got his start hauling bootleg Canadian whiskey in his family's Michigan laundry delivery trucks.
When he and the Cleveland Syndicate moved from Newport's Beverly Hills Country Club ($426,199 net profit in 1948–49) and Lookout House to the Desert Inn and Stardust, traditional banks wouldn't touch casino paper, so naturally, they turned to Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters Central States Pension Fund (an alliance Dalitz forged by brokering a $17,500 payoff to settle the 1949 Detroit laundry-truck strike).
How did a truckers' union end up sitting on enough cash ($91M in loans by 1961) to build the Vegas strip?
The Motor Carrier Act of 1935 locked interstate trucking into protected routes. In 1953 (ATA v. United States, 344 U.S. 298), the Teamsters even hired Burton K. Wheeler (the senator who sponsored the 1935 Act) to appear at the Supreme Court defending the ICC rules that abolished one-trip "gypsy" leasing.
Protected ICC routes on top built the Teamsters pension bank that funded Vegas.
Meanwhile, up to 150,000 private and exempt carriers exploited the loopholes created by regulation.
The same topic my pinned article is all about.
Stephen Ruhe retweeted
👇🏽 – at Winchester, NV
I wrote an article on the history of trucking and the loopholes that set the stage for our current industry.
The ATA was started with a lot of effort by John Keeshin. He would eventually leave because it had lost its way.
In 1953, the ATA would lose a lawsuit in the Supreme Court vs. The ICC trying to repeal the lease on rules they out into effect.
The same rules that the ICC determined were being use to circumvent the regulations by disgusting entities or shuffling controlling parties.
The issues of today run deep in trucking.
She might be tiny... but don't sleep on the Ford Maverick. Hands down one of the funner trucks I've driven in awhile.
Everybody blames 1980 deregulation for chameleon carriers.
In 1953 the Supreme Court, upholding the ICC's truck-leasing rules, said loose leases "permit evasions" of federal authority.
1980 wasn't the problem. 🧵
5/
The whole story, from 1935 to today's authority cycling, is in the Article below.
What's the oldest trick in this business you still see every week?
Full article
xitter.cf/StephenRuhe/status/211…
ATA v. United States (1953) is a good case to study the origins of the current state of the industry, but whoever prompted the AI didn't think to ask if a magnet would work on a 1968 Kenworth, Pete, or Freightliner cabover.
Those cab doors were riveted aluminum and the industry was also shifting to fiberglass/composite to reduce weight... magnets don't stick to either of these.
Also.. a 15$ county clerk DBA couldn't get you across a state line under the ICC either, existing fleets protested almost every new application in Washington. And three years after the Supreme Court upheld the 30-day lease rule in 1953, Congress carved agricultural backhauls right back out of it in 1956.
The real exploits during the regulated era in the ICC record wasn't magnets, it was more complicated than that. Much like paper logs are more complicated than Elogs.
It was pasteboard "Leased To" signs in door brackets and a pad of blank, pre-signed trip leases in the door pocket so a gypsy driver could write his own lease on the shoulder if an inspector pulled him around back.
Buy/sell tactics, private carrier status, and (as mentioned briefly prior) ag exemptions.
AI is great at a lot of things... history ain't it.
The FMCSA , mega-brokers and self made vigilantes act like "chameleon carriers" are some brand-new tech scam destroying the freight market and trucking.
Total bullshit. It’s the oldest hustle in American trucking.
The playbook didn’t start with DAT or cheap online MC numbers. It was invented 65+ years ago under the iron boot of the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC).
Here’s the truth corporate trucking wants forgotten:
1/ The Original Cartel (1935–1980)
Back under the ICC, hauling freight across state lines without a Certificate of Public Convenience & Necessity was a federal crime.
The railroads and established fleets owned the rights. An independent owner-operator couldn't legally haul a load of steel across a state line.
So the boys did what truckers do: they ran outlaw. They called it "Wildcatting."
2/ The "Baggie Door" Hustle
Today, dispatchers email a driver a fresh PDF cab sign when an authority gets red-tagged.
In 1968? Drivers carried a trash bag under the bunk stuffed with magnetic placards and sheet metal signs painted with grease pencils.
You left Pennsylvania as "Fleet A." Before you crossed the Ohio line, you pulled onto the shoulder, ripped off the magnets, and slapped on "Fleet B" with an ICC number you scribbled off a parked rig at a truck stop.
3/ The Ghost Trip-Lease Racket
Big carriers with ICC rights didn't have enough trucks, so they "leased" outlaw owner-operators under the table for a 25% cut.
If the load arrived clean, everybody got paid cash.
If the truck rolled over or blew a recap through a windshield? The carrier shredded the carbon-copy lease and swore under oath they never heard of the guy.
It got so filthy it went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1953 (ATA v. US) just to force carriers to take 30-day responsibility for the iron they leased.
4/ The "Midnight Rebirth"
Got caught by ICC road agents? State revoked your tax permits?
Nobody parked the iron.
You retitled the tractor under your cousin’s name, registered a new DBA down at the county clerk’s office for $15, painted a new name on the door, and were back hammering down the highway the next morning.
5/ The Tech Changed. The Game Didn’t.
Then: Magnetic signs, carbon-copy paper, and running 85 mph through scale bypasses at 2:00 AM.
Now: A $300 FMCSA filing, virtual mailbox, and an automated load board.
Same shell game. Same hustle.
The funniest part? The mega-carriers sitting on safety boards preaching zero-tolerance today were built by men who wrote the original rulebook on how to run ghost iron without authority.
The system created the chameleon. It always has.
#american #trucking # trucker #chameleon #peterbilt #kenworth
Answer for everyone who took a swing at it: May 1943 in Charlotte, North Carolina.
John Vachon shot this Richfield tank truck for the Office of War Information. The tell on the front bumper is the "O.D.T." tag—starting in late 1942, every commercial truck in America had to carry an Office of Defense Transportation Certificate of War Necessity just to get rationed tires, parts, and fuel.
How many of you have been trapped in the wrong lane on that deck?
Pittsburgh, PA coming out of the 3,614-foot Fort Pitt Tunnel under Mount Washington onto the Fort Pitt Bridge over the Monongahela River.
Why does this tunnel exist?
Exactly 201 years ago today at 10:00 AM on October 26, 1825, New York opened the Erie Canal at Buffalo, firing an 80-minute cannon relay all the way to Manhattan in celebration.
Since New York had the only natural water-level slot through the Appalachians, freight costs from Lake Erie to the coast dropped from roughly $100 a ton before the canal to about $10 by mid-century, and western wheat jumped from 30 cents a bushel to $1.00 (Cadwallader D. Colden, 1825 Memoir). New York went around the mountains on water.
To compete for Midwest freight, Pennsylvania had to bore straight through the rock. Starting in 1834 with Allegheny Portage Railroad to the 1940 Pennsylvania Turnpike tunnels, and finally the double-deck Fort Pitt Bridge (opened June 19, 1959, the first major bridge engineered on an IBM 650 computer) and Fort Pitt Tunnel (opened September 1, 1960).
Today, you get 1,180 feet of yellow steel to cross four lanes before you miss your turn.
Stephen Ruhe retweeted
Here’s Greenwood, IN complete with a Amazon contractor dropping bins out the back of his trailer on the surface streets
I thought my taxes were supposed to go towards fixing these roads, yet, they can still knock a tampon out of a nun.
