Triangle Fire In Industrial History

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A New Yorker does not have to step too far from their stoop to encounter one of the country’s most significant historical landmarks oozing with a rich past that helped model the society and politics set in place today. One of history’s most tragic, yet politically significant events occurred right around the corner from the now vibrant Washington Square Park. The Triangle fire that broke out at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory on that day remains one of the worst events in American industrial history. The Triangle Waist Company was one of the biggest garment factories in New York and owned by Max Blanck and Isaac Harris, also known as the “Shirtwaist Kings.” Triangle was the place of employment for hundreds of immigrant women, mostly in …show more content…
McFarlane, an expert in fire prevention and fire insurance. The City’s Board of Aldermen was also aware of the dangers. In 1909, it spent time inspecting the problem and ended up with proposed revisions of the building code, one of which required street-side fire escapes on buildings with architecture similar to that of the Asch building. The fire that lasted a horrific half- hour ended up propelling lifelong effects on the lives and safety of future generations in the labor force. Just one year before the event, the same girls who died that afternoon had gone on strike to demand more sanitary conditions and more safety precautions in the shop. Their dead bodies would be what would finally set in motion the changes they demanded. The Triangle fire occurred during the political movement referred to as progressivism. Those with a progressive mindset supported the vote for women, protection for workers and consumers, and trade unionism. Progressives fought for the rights of the less fortunate in the city. They brought to surface all the things the city needed to fix: filthy housing, unsafe workplaces, garbage in the streets, orphans being neglected, widespread vice and corruption. The progressives, the majority being bright college students from the country’s top colleges, recorded firsthand what it was like to work in a factory or sweatshop similar to The Triangle. Their findings appeared in journals and …show more content…
The brave efforts of many women were seen after the fire. One of these brave women was Frances Perkins, who was having tea near the fire scene and who would later work with Robert F. Wagner and Alfred E. Smith to rewrite New York labor law, and launch the changes that would later become the New Deal. One of Perkins’ main priorities and tireless efforts was to see the passage of the Social Security Bill, which was signed by Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935. A great part of the formation of the New Deal can be credited to the sacrifices of those 146 workers who died in that terrible fire on March 25,
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