Triangle Factory Fire Case Study

Sweatshops have been around for centuries, beginning around the late 1880’s. Sweatshops are classified by three main components, long work hours, very low pay and unsafe and unhealthy working environments. Sweatshops are usually found in manufacturing industries and the most highlighted production is clothing corporations, who take full advantage of the low production costs of their products. Many may think sweatshops are a thing of the past but they are still affecting many lives across the nations. There are many ways sweatshops affect lives, but a recent article titled “New study finds ‘more sweatshops than Starbucks’ in Chicago” explains that there are many low wage industry jobs that are violating labor laws in the United States alone. The article also reports how employees who are working in such conditions won’t speak up in fear of the retaliation employers will implement. Analyzing Sweatshops through the lens of the Sociological perspectives will help us better understand the illegal conditions of workplaces that still exist today.

The Triangle was undoubtedly one of the most tragic events in the worlds history. The not only is the fire a horrifying event, but the factory had no safety precautions and didn’t have any emergency exits and kept doors locked. Not only did this strike sorrow on the community, but it awakened people to realize that workplace safety is a serious thing and needs to be practiced.

Thesis = Even though the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire was a horrible event and killed a lot of people, it helped the United States improve their factory working conditions and helped strengthen the woman's work unions.

Time and time again, there have been opposing views on just about every single possible topic one could fathom. From the most politically controversial topics of gun control and stem cell research to the more mundane transparent ones of brown or white rice and hat or no hat—it continues. Sweatshops and the controversy surrounding them is one that is unable to be put into simplistic terms, for sweatshops themselves are complex. The grand debate of opposing views in regards to sweatshops continues between two writers who both make convincing arguments as to why and how sweatshops should or should not be dealt with. In Sweat, Fire and Ethics, by Bob Jeffcott, he argues that more people ought to worry less about the outer layers of sweatshops and delve deeper into the real reason they exist and the unnecessariness of them. In contrast, Jeffrey D. Sachs writes of the urgent requirement of sweatshops needed during the industrialization time in a developing country, in his article of Bangladesh: On the Ladder of Development. The question is then asked: How do sweatshops positively and negatively affect people here in the United States of America and in other countries around the world?

These are the survivors thoughts on the Triangle Factory Fire. There was over 100 survivors but I choose two of the most important people who lived from the fire and I am sharing their thoughts.

What’s important to examine is that before the Triangle Factory Fire is that that casualties from unsafe conditions were reported and expressed as a concern before. Where was the outrage that pushed for safer working conditions? The answer to that is that there were many times that people were upset with such conditions.

Frances Perkins came from a wealthy family in Maine. From her mother, she inherited the propensity to be stingy with money, earnest, and brutally honest. In 1902, she attended Mount Holyoke College, where she used her glibness to barely get by. Instead of focusing on improving her strengths, Frances’ professors sought to improve her weaknesses; Especially her moral ones. This was done with the idea in mind that if she were to overcome her shortcomings, she would be able to conquer anything life threw at her. After graduation, Frances struggled to find something meaningful to do with her life; That is the tragedy of The

In today’s time, it is almost impossible to to find a building that does not have exit signs or fire extinguishers here in America. Fire drills are regularly practiced in schools and workplaces to ensure the tiniest amount of fatality would not occur. However, it wasn’t like that in the 1900’s. Neither safety issues nor regulations were taken into thought. “The waist industry was flourishing in New York: there were more than five hundred blouse factories, employing upward of forty thousand workers.” In this time of history, the Triangle Waist Company was the largest manufacturer of women’s shirtwaist in the entire country! On March 25, 1911, one hundred and forty six individuals lost their life to what was one of the biggest events in history

Around thirty labor laws were enforced in reaction to the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire. A major law was enacted where employees should not have to risk their lives or health in the work place. Other laws included that all high risk building had to have automatic sprinkler systems installed and that all exits had to be unlocked and swing to the outside. It is pivotal that safety measures are taken serious and enforced in a workplace. Deadly fires are bound to happen when the owners of a company neglect the safety of their workers and that is what caused this

One policy that city could do to respond to all those young girls dead bodies was to make a specific policy about women workers safety or salary. As the stand-in History.com website the women right movement start in 1848 and ends up in 1920.The Triangle factory fire happened in 1911 during the women right movement, at that time women did not have that much right to fight for their safety and or higher

The New York City Triangle Waist Company fire was a disastrous event that paved the road for Progressive Era reforms. A day after the fire, there was an article, “Death List Shows Few Identified,” published by the New York Times listing the identifiable and unidentifiable dead and the injured. Because of the revealed appalling working conditions and the gruesome deaths the workers came to, the reader now desires to join the Progressive movement for improved working conditions and factory safety. The historical Triangle Waist Company fire resulted in not only local factory reforms but national factory reforms as well as increased women’s rights. The “Death List Shows Few Identified” article provides a statistical representation and depiction

That evening, nearly 600 workers were working in the 10 floors of the Asch Building. Near closing time on March 25th, 1911, the fire broke out on the top floors. Oil that was spread all over the floors and tables of the sweatshop helped to increase the volume of the fire rapidly. The chaos that ensued created a crowded, dangerous pandemonium. One of the main disregarded safety features that lead to nearly 50 deaths was the locked stairwell doors. The doors had been locked by Blanck and Harris as a “safety procedure” to keep employees from stealing. During the fire, workers fled to the stairs, only to find they were trapped inside. In addition, out of the four elevators located in the building, only one was operational, and that elevator broke down after just four trips. In a desperate attempt to flee, girls waiting for the elevator plunged down the shaft to their deaths. The old and rusted fire escape on the eastern side of the building collapsed after it was overcrowded. Other girls who did not make it to the stairwells or elevators began jumping to the sidewalk. As firefighters arrived to fight the fire, bodies landed on their firehoses, making it difficult to extinguish the flames. Firefighters also brought ladders that only reached up to the 7th floor. The water pressure of the firehoses was not powerful enough to reach the burning levels of the building, and the nets brought to catch jumping women ended up ripped and torn after only a few uses, leaving girls with nothing to catch them apart from the concrete sidewalk. Those in the floors above the fire, including both Blanck and Harris, escaped the inferno to adjoining buildings from the rooftops. Remarkably, after just 18 minutes, the crisis was over. 49 workers had burned to death or were suffocated by the smoke, 36 were dead in the elevator shaft, 59 died from jumping to the concrete sidewalks. 2 later

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory took place on March 25th, 1911 which led to 145 deaths. These deaths could have been prevented if the owner’s, Max Blanck and Isaac Harris would have kept up on proper maintenance within the building. There were several reasons why they should have been found guilty for manslaughter, but the courts found them to be not guilty. The reasons are as follows; doors were locked from the outside, water pressure in the hoses wasn’t sufficient and the hose nozzle was rusted shut, no sprinkler system found anywhere in the building, and only 3 of the 4 elevators were in good working order.

In the early twentieth century New York City was a hub of garment manufacturing. The majority of workers were poor, new immigrants who spoke little English and were desperate for money to keep themselves and their families afloat. At the time there were no safety laws, public policies, and very few unions to protect workers while on the job. It was a time when the market economy ruled unbridled without concern for the human condition or safety. In 1911 a fire broke out at the Triangle Factory building and no one notified the workers floors below. With one exit locked, no working fire escape, and no oversight 146 workers perished while onlookers watched helplessly as they lept to their death or burned inside the factory. While both the owners of the factory and employees may have helped in preventing or minimizing the disaster, the legacy of the Triangle Fire is that the fire could have been prevented or its effects minimized by the factory owners making specific changes.

In a third world country, jobs are not easy to come by; especially jobs that pay enough to sustain a living. However, various individuals living in these desolate places have found a solution that seems repulsive to people fortunate enough to live in a first world country; sweatshops. On April 24th, 2013, in Dhaka, a district in central Bangladesh, a sweatshop collapsed on the workers inside, killing a thousand and injuring over two thousand. People were aghast at the working conditions in sweatshops exposed in this event. Raveena Aulakh, Toronto Star journalist, went undercover at a sweatshop to see the factory conditions and wrote about her experience in the article, “I Got Hired at a Bangladesh Sweatshop. Meet my 9-year-old Boss”. The article