in 1865, a train carried the President's body from Washington D.C. to Springfield, Illinois.

Behind the funeral procession, a Pullman sleeping car offered comfortable quarters for several dignitaries.

- It got a lot of press and media attention.

People started to pay more attention nationally to this beautiful car that Mr. Pullman had created and built.

- [Narrator] New orders came pouring in and by 1879, the company had 464 cars for lease and gross annual earnings of $2.2 million.

In today's money that would be more than $65 million.

As production grew, so did Pullman's workforce: draftsmen, carpenters, painters and more.

- Most of the factory jobs were held by the Southern and Eastern European immigrants.

- It is a job that demands extensive hours.

There's no such thing as a day off.

Railroad captains of industry really are demigods and we have this incredible polarization between the extremely wealthy and workers who are producing all of this wealth but don't have any means whatsoever to gain control of some of it.

And, as a result, they live in squalor, they work in dangerous conditions and they're bereft of any political power.

- [Narrator] George Pullman claimed to do as much for labor as any man living and said he tried to treat his men squarely.

In exchange, he expected loyalty.

- Pullman, along with other industrialists at the time had a concern about keeping their workers in the workplace.

So maybe we have to pay them a little bit more 'cause we want them to come back.

Maybe we don't want to kill them in the workplace, 'cause we want them to come back.

Maybe we don't want them living in squalor where they could suffer disease 'cause we want them to come back.

- [Narrator] In 1880, George Pullman bought 4,000 acres just south of Chicago and established a company town where his white employees both lived and worked.

He named the town: Pullman.

- He hoped that it would be capitalism helping labor while labor helps capitalism.

- [Narrator] Pullman's vision: a capitalist utopia where everything a worker might need from housing to goods and services sat right within the town's borders.

- The company itself actually had no restriction to race who would live in the town of Pullman but let's face it, there were societal limitations based on race.

Predominant workforce that were doing the manufacturing were mostly white workers and so that was the bulk of the residents here in the manufacturing town.

- [Narrator] Porters and maids lived closer to the rail lines in neighborhoods like Bronzeville.

- [Sue] So George Pullman built very comfortable, luxurious homes for the time.

The workers could rent them from the company and it was an opportunity for workers to sort of improve their lives.

- So behind me is a good example of the row houses that were built here.

These houses would have belonged to skilled workers and managers.

- [Sue] They had their own running water inside.

- [Larry] That was unusual except for well-to-do people.

- [Sue] That, plus the gas lighting, they washed the macadam streets every day.

They picked up the trash.

It really was an uplift for many of the workers from the kind of living situations that they had before.

- [Narrator] Not only was it good for workers, it was also good for business.

- [Larry] It was his town.

He collected rent.

He grew the food that people bought, the shopping center, the arcade, everything there went into the profit, including the church rent.

- [Narrator] For the first 13 years, it ran like a well-oiled machine.

At its height, the town of Pullman housed a total of 12,000 workers and their families.

Pullman's heavy hand had a far reach from the books in the library to goods in the grocery.

- [Larry] On the surface, everything is beautiful and clean.

People from the outside would come here and think of this as an ideal community.

- The idea behind a town that he constructs in his own name is really about control.

It's about making workers dependent and expecting full loyalty.

- [Narrator] Behind the facade of brick and mortar, Pullman's workers were facing major hardship.

By late 1893, 13 years after the town was founded, a financial panic had gripped the country and George Pullman was feeling the pinch.

- As the contracts for new cars dry up, Pullman starts laying off workers.

And they laid off huge numbers.

- [Narrator] Pullman was in a tight spot.

He had guaranteed his investors a 6% net profit each year.

So to protect his bottom line, Pullman slashed wages by 25% but workers' rent stayed the same.

- You know, you think about it today, would a landlord today reduce rent if there was an economic depression?

No.

The difference here with the Pullman Company was the company was both the employer and the landlord.