Trains Of Thought
A Tribute to Stanley Grizzle
Project Overview
BCRC programming from 2024–2025
Trains of Thought is a BCRC-led audio project that reflects this mission through storytelling, education, and intergenerational dialogue.
Launched in September 2024, the project is an audio tribute to Stanley Sinclair Grizzle, sleeping car porter, civil rights advocate, and trailblazer whose legacy continues to shape conversations around Black labour history, resistance, and leadership in Canada.
The project explores the often-overlooked realities of sleeping car porters, shedding light on the harsh working conditions they endured, the dignity with which they carried themselves, and the quiet but powerful role they played in advancing civil rights. At the same time, Trains of Thought is firmly rooted in the present and future. Central to the project is the active participation of Black youth, who contribute their voices, reflections, and perspectives, drawing connections between historical struggles and contemporary experiences.
By blending historical tribute with youth-led storytelling, Trains of Thought serves as both a commemorative and forward-looking initiative, honouring legacy, amplifying youth voices, and strengthening community through shared memory, dialogue, and creative expression.
Gallery
Event flyers & photos.
Podcast Episodes
Episode Title. The Pipedream of Moving Up North
In this episode of Trains of Thought, host Khaya Salmon explores the emotional and cultural realities of Caribbean-Canadian immigration through intimate conversations with her mother, Jackie, and best friend, LaTonya. Inspired by the stories found in Stanley Grizzle’s personal archive, Khaya reflects on what has and hasn’t changed since the days of the sleeping car porters and their families who migrated north in search of opportunity. Through shared memories, moments of culture shock, and reflections on belonging, this episode offers a heartfelt look at the weight and wonder of building a life far from home and what it means to carry one’s roots across borders.
Episode Title: Pilgrimage in a Fragmented Space
On this episode of Trains of Thought, Jephte Joseph explores pilgrimage as more than a journey and sits down with Andrew Jackson. A search for solace in spaces once sustained by determination, moulded to help us face reality, yet haunted by the urge to relive a past grown blurry. What happens when the place we seek slips away, leaving us scattered and returning only to fragments? In those fragments, we find not wholeness, but traces that remind us some returns can never be complete, yet still shape how we carry the past
within us.
Episode Title: Postcards from the Road: Black Porters, Untold Journeys & the Stories We Carry
In this episode of Trains of Thought, host Khaya Salmon explores the emotional and cultural realities of Caribbean-Canadian immigration through intimate conversations with her mother, Jackie, and best friend, LaTonya. Inspired by the stories found in Stanley Grizzle’s personal archive, Khaya reflects on what has and hasn’t changed since the days of the sleeping car porters and their families who migrated north in search of opportunity. Through shared memories, moments of culture shock, and reflections on belonging, this episode offers a heartfelt look at the weight and wonder of building a life far from home and what it means to carry one’s roots across borders.
Episode Title. The Sisters Behind the Brotherhood
On this episode of Trains of Thought, Kayla Garnett conducts a meaningful conversation with Dr. Abel Bartley, and African American Studies and History professor at Clemson University. They delve into the stories of women who bolstered the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, exploring themes of resistance, perseverance, and resilience fostered by the wives, sisters, and daughters of the men at the vanguard of sleeping car porter unionization efforts.
This podcast is for the curious… those who are open and receptive to movements in the past that inform our present.
Episode Title: Riding the Train For the First Time: Oral History for the Untrained Oral Historian
On this episode of Trains of Thought, Jean-Philippe Djehoury speaks with Dr. Stacey Zembrzycki, an oral historian and author of According to Baba, about two unlikely yet powerful oral historians: her Ukrainian-Canadian grandmother, Olga Zembrzycki, and Stanley Grizzle, a Black Canadian porter and civil rights leader.
Neither had formal training in oral history. But both became key figures in preserving the memory of their communities—Sudbury’s Ukrainian immigrants and Canada’s Black railway porters. How? And at what cost?
Together, we explore the concept of experiential authority: the intuitive power and pitfalls of storytelling from within a community. From ethical tensions to emotional breakthroughs, this episode is a guide for every passionate memory keeper wondering: Do I need to be trained to do this work? The response of our guest might surprise you. (Spoiler: Yes, you can do it without training. Tune in to know how!)
Whether you’re an untrained storyteller, an emerging historian, or someone recording your community’s past at the kitchen table, this conversation is for you.
Episode Title: Mobilizing Unity, Labour, Legacy, and Multicultural Solidarity
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