Day in the life
Life was tough at the supposedly fireproof triangle shirtwaist factory United States, 1911
How fast fashion led to the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire
In the 1900s, New York City employed more than 30,000 workers in the garment-making industry. Most popular was the creation of the shirtwaist, a functional button-down blouse worn by many working class women. These were produced, most infamously, at the Triangle Shirtwaist factory in Manhattan.
The women were exploited by subcontractors and bosses who cared little for the most basic workers’ rights, and there was also little attention to the building’s numerous fire hazards – it had already been ablaze twice in 1902. The fire on 25 March 1911, however, was by far the worst. While it led to new laws being introduced, it was too late for the 123 women and 23 men who perished.
starting work
Most of the 500 garment workers at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory were Italian and Jewish immigrant women aged between 15 and 23 and they worked on the eighth, ninth and tenth floors of the Asch Building in New York City. They were expected to be ready for their 12-hour days at 7am, if not earlier, for which they would receive between $7 and $12 each week.
creating garments
The work was relentless. The bosses would place a pile of material on one side of each worker’s sewing machine and they had to get through the lot by the end of the day. For those on piecework wages, the faster they worked, the more money they would receive but all would toil in spaces so cramped that other workers would often have to walk sideways to get down the aisles.
toilet break
If the women became desperate for the toilet they had two options: to go during the one bathroom break they had each day or relieve themselves on the floor. The toilet was in a different building and, to stop the workers from sneaking out for a rest or stealing items, the owners locked the doors to the stairwells and exits.
Lunchtime
Lunch had to be squeezed into half-an-hour but it was a welcome break, not only from the pedal work involved in operating the sewing machines but the barking bosses who would shout at them all day. Even so, the only daylight would be seen by those working on the front row of machines nearest to the windows. Gaslights lit the rest of the factory.
union activism
Garment workers had already gone on strike over their conditions, back in 1909 when 20 per cent of the Triangle workforce walked out. It prompted 20,000 workers at other factories to do the same but it was a struggle to get the Triangle bosses to agree to change and workers were denied union representation. Despite that, attempts to enlist others into the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union continued.
fire! fire!
Beneath the large work benches on which the sewing machines sat were large waste bins that contained paper patterns and scraps of material. As people were thinking about leaving for the day on 25 March 1911, it is thought that a lit match was accidentally dropped into one of these bins on the eighth floor. A manager tried in vain to extinguish it using water pails while a bookkeeper sought to warn those on the upper floors. The fire took hold.
evacuation attempts
A passerby spotted smoke billowing out of the windows as the fire engulfed the entire floor. He raised the alarm while the women inside sought to evacuate as quickly as possible. Some managed to get down the fire escape before it collapsed under the heat and their weight. Others tried the lifts but those who looked to get out through the stairway exit doors found them locked. Many burned alive.
death toll
Firefighters hoped to rescue them but their ladders only reached the sixth floor. In desperation, many women – some in groups – leaped from the windows and died on impact with the ground. The lift had also buckled under the weight of those trying to escape and while some managed to get to the roof and move to other buildings, the fire claimed 146 lives.