on strike on 23 May 1946. The strike stranded travelers, prevented movement of perishable goods and caused concern that many people in war-devastated Europe would starve if grain shipments were delayed. Truman broadcast an appeal to the strikers to return to work, and threatened to call out the army to end the strike. On 25 May the strikers accepted his terms. Johnston retired from the BLE in 1950. Recent years The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers was North America's oldest rail labor union when it merged with the Teamsters in 2004. The union sold its downtown Cleveland, Ohio, headquarters (the Standard Building) in July 2014. The union purchased new headquarters in the Cleveland suburb of Independence, Ohio, in March 2015. The union said it would move its headquarters to Independence when its lease at its old property ended in summer 2016. Locomotive Engineers Mutual Life and Accident Insurance Association The BLE had an insurance association, called the Locomotive Engineers Mutual Life and Accident Insurance Association. Founded in 1867, membership in the association was open to members of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, their wives, widows, children and grandchildren, as well as "persons, their wives and eligible children who are represented under contracts for group insurance coverage between the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and the railroad industry." Local units of the group were called branches and was governed by a quadrennial national convention. The association was headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio and had a membership of 30,000 in 1968 and 20,000 in 1979. Leadership Edward Hall serves as the national president of the BLET. Notable members Patrick Fennell, known for his railway-inspired poetry See also Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers Hall, in Forsyth, Montana, listed on the National Register of Historic Places List of American railway unions United Transportation Union Great Railroad Strike of 1877 American Railway Union Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen Samuel Cochrane Union Pacific Railroad Co. v. Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers References Citations Sources Further reading Eric Arnesen, "'Like Banquo's Ghost, It Will Not Down': The Race Question and the American Railroad Brotherhoods, 1880-1920," American Historical Review, vol. 99, no. 5 (Dec. 1994), pp. 1601–1633. In JSTOR George R. Horton and H. Ellsworth Steele, "The Unity Issue among Railroad Engineers and Firemen," Industrial and Labor Relations Review, vol. 10, no. 1 (Oct. 1956), pp. 48–69. In JSTOR. Jon R. Huibregtse, American Railroad Labor and the Genesis of the New Deal, 1919-1935. University