Robert James McGoings Jr., a retired Baltimore & Ohio dining-car waiter and expert on the African-American Pentecostal Movement, died of a stroke Dec. 7 at Brightwood retirement community in Lutherville. The former longtime Wildwood Parkway resident was 85.
Mr. McGoings was born in Baltimore and raised in Philadelphia and South Baltimore. The Douglass High School graduate also studied at the former Morgan State College before going to work in 1937 as a dining car waiter for the B&O.;
In 1972, after the railroad's passenger operations became part of Amtrak, he continued working as a waiter-in-charge for the carrier until retiring in 1979.
"At the time he came along, if you were an African-American man, it was very prestigious if you worked for the post office or railroad," said his son, Michael Charles McGoings, assistant chief judge of the U.S. Immigration Court and a Fort Washington resident.
"He loved railroads and trains, and his job gave him the opportunity of visiting other cities and churches. He never wanted another job," the son said.
Mr. McGoings worked on some of the B & O's most prestigious trains, including the Capitol Limited, National Limited, Ambassador, Royal Blue and the Cleveland Night Express.
He also worked on the presidential specials that transported Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman.
"It was the heyday of passenger trains when meals were cooked from scratch in the diner and the table was set with real china and polished silver. Everyone rode trains then, and in addition to presidents, he served governors, senators, movie stars and other notables," Judge McGoings said.
He had served as vice president of the United Transport Service Employees Union Local 320 and district chairman of the Hotel Restaurant and Dining Car Employees Union Local 495.
He was also an outspoken defender of employees brought up on charges by railroad management or before the Railroad Retirement Board, his son said.
As a youngster, he joined the First Apostolic Faith Church in Baltimore, and since 1968, had been a member of the First United Church of Jesus Christ Apostolic.
Throughout his life, he assembled a large library of religious books and audio and video tapes.
Much of his library, said family members, consists of primary source materials covering the period from the 1930s to the present on the Oneness or Jesus-Only Movement. He later donated much of this material to the Schomberg Collection's African-American Holiness Pentecostal Collection at the New York Public Library.
He also had been a neighborhood block captain in his Edmondson Village neighborhood for many years and had served as treasurer of the Southwestern District Police Community Relations Council for seven years.
Mr. McGoings was also an avid collector of American coins.
He was married in 1940 to Florence E. Jones, who died in 1995.
Services will be held at 10:30 a.m. today at First United Church of Jesus Christ Apostolic, 5150 Baltimore National Pike.
In addition to his son, Mr. McGoings is survived by three grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Another son, Robert James McGoings III, died in 1973.