Essay: The Triangle Fire of 1911

​One of the most tragic fires in United States history took place in New York City. Owners of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory practiced horrid workplace ethic that resulted in the death of well over one hundred people. The Triangle Fire of 1911 would change how workers are treated from that day forward. The owners of the company would get away with murder in the eyes of the law but not in the eyes of the people.
The danger of fire in factories like the Triangle Shirtwaist was well-known, but there was no government intervention. As well as little to no legislation to protect the health and safety of workers. Blanck and Harris’ had obvious anti-worker policies. Their employees were paid less than $2 a day, despite working 14 hours a day, every day. They accomplished this by docking their pay for supplies and/or mistakes. In 1909 the International Ladies Garment Workers Union led a strike demanding safer shops, shorter hours and better pay, Blanck and Harris’ company was one of the very few companies to resist. They hired prostitutes who came along with their pimps to beat the women. They also hired professional fighters who would beat them bad enough to send them to hospitals. The police would come and either arrest the women and/or beat them as well. When 10,000 workers marched through City Hall with complaints of police brutality, the judge simply shooed them away.
On March 25, a Saturday afternoon, a cigarette that was dropped on the eighth floor of the Asch Building started a fire that would change American history. As the fire grew panic set in and  workers scrambled to get out of the building by running to elevators, stairs and fire escapes. Trip after trip was made with the elevators but it could only hold 12 people at a time. People who were on the floors above them escaped through the roof and then to adjoining buildings, Blanck and Harris being two of those people. On the two floors below them there was chaos as people ran frantically to get out of the building. Out of desperation to escape the fire, some girls that were left behind waiting for the elevator plunged down the shaft to their deaths. Many could have fled through the exit at the Washington Place, however it was apart of Blanck and Harris’ policy that, that door remained locked, many were burned alive.
As firefighters arrived, they witnessed a tragedy. The girls who were not able to make it stairwells, elevators or fire escapes were trapped inside the building and begging for help. Some began to jump out of windows, falling to their deaths. The bodies of the jumpers fell on the fire hoses, which made it hard for firefighters to fight the fire. Furthermore, the firefighters ladders reached only to the seventh floor and the fire was on the eighth floor. A man recalled that he “saw groups of women embracing each other and leaping to the sidewalk. The firemen were helpless. The nets were ripped from their hands, many stooped and picked up the nets again with their hands bleeding.”(PBS transcript)This only added to the tragedy that was taking place.
Within 30 minutes, it was all over and the firefighters we able to put the fire out. As they began to gather all the bodies, the death toll continued to rise. Fifty-three had jumped or fallen from the windows. Nineteen fell in the elevator shaft. More than twenty tumbled off the fire escape. And at least fifty burned to death on the factory floor. All but twenty-three of the dead were women, nearly half of them were teen-agers.
One could argue that owners Max Blanck and Isaac Harris were and should have been held responsible for the deaths of the women and men who died during the fire. One of the main reasons being that they were tyrants and treated their workers in an inhumane way. Not allowing them to leave during a 14 hour work shift. Docking their pay for needles, thread, and the electricity used during their shift. Also not allowing them to leave (by locking the only other exit in the building) without getting their bags checked because they were paranoid about losing even a penny’s worth of materials. Like many other companies during this time, there was gross amount of negligence taking place. What sets the owners of The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory apart from other businesses that practiced the same workplace ethic is the fact that they constantly had an exit locked. They were aware of this and yet no effort was made to save the people by sending the key two floors down. This exit could have been used to save a number of lives during the fire.
In conclusion, the fire touch the hearts of many and it also made many feel guilty knowing that these women were on strike asking/demanding something be done about the work environment and now the majority of those very women were dead and it was due to negligence. The triangle shirtwaist factory fire is a perfect example of why workplace reformation had to take place. Workers needed laws to be place to protect them for companies who merely saw them as numbers and not as people. Within two year, 30 laws were passed to improve the workforce experience.