46 pages • 1 hour read
David Von DrehleTriangle: The Fire That Changed America
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2003A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 7-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary: “Fallout”
In the aftermath of the Triangle fire, labor leaders and socialists argued that the tragedy proved that “no one would protect the workers but the workers themselves” (171). They suspected that what happened following previous disasters would happen again: There would be widespread shock and outrage, and those in power would pay lip service to the need for reform while waiting for the tragedy to be forgotten. New York district attorney Charles Seymour Whitman, an ambitious politician who knew how to generate positive press, was among the first to recognize the political implications of the fire. Whitman, who arrived at the scene just as firefighters were getting the blaze under control, realized that New Yorkers “would demand that someone, or some agency, be held accountable” (178). While many in the crowd that day thought that the fire department should have done more, Whitman knew that he would have to go after either the city’s building department or the owners of the factory.
By March 30, the final victim died in the hospital, bringing the death toll to 146, but it took nearly a full week to identify all the bodies. Von Drehle argues that “questions of how the victims died, who was to blame, and what was to be done all blurred with each passing day” (184). While some newspapers exercised caution, others called for new laws, and still others went after the owners. Blanck and Harris, however, “vehemently denied that the doors of the Triangle were ever locked during working hours” (185). The fire marshal backed up their claim, but evidence showed that the Washington Place doors had been locked. While Whitman leaked the news that criminal indictments for the owners were coming, newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst, who had his own political ambitions, went after the bureaucrats behind the building codes. According to Von Drehle, “Whitman’s new emphasis took interest away from the drive for sweeping reforms” (188). Similarly, the political wrangling between Whitman, Hearst, and Tammany Hall meant that nothing substantial would be done.
Chapter 8 Summary: “Reform”
In Chapter 8, Von Drehle examines the efforts for reform that took place after the Triangle fire and introduces several key figures in the reform efforts. Among these is Frances Perkins, who was nearby having tea with another influential progressive woman when she heard the sirens and rushed to the scene of the fire. At the time, Perkins was the executive secretary of the Consumer’s League, an organization devoted to improving working conditions. She had become dedicated to fire safety after the Newark fire the year before. One of her first jobs with the Consumer’s League was as a lobbyist in Albany, pushing for a 54-hour workweek bill for women and minors. Though her bill would get stuck, she received advice from state senators Alfred E. Smith and Robert F. Wagner, who together came to be known as the “Tammany Twins.” Smith and Wagner were the younger proteges of Tammany Hall boss Chalie Murphy. By putting the day-to-day business of Tammany Hall in the hands of Smith and Wagner, Murphy would move Tammany past its reputation for corruption and into the era of reform (201).
After the Triangle fire, Perkins recalls that the mood of reformers like herself was guilt, but that mood “soon hardened into resolve” (206). Progressives and socialists called for a mass meeting at the Metropolitan Opera House, and after a rousing speech, they voted to send a committee on safety to Albany and demand change. Smith and Wagner again stepped in to help and suggested that only a legislative commission could get anything done. Governor John Alden Dix signed a law creating the Factory Investigating Commission (FIC) three months after the fire, giving it powers unprecedented in New York history. The change from the Tammany Hall that harassed shirtwaist strikers to the safety-reform-minded Tammany Hall was shocking. With the Tammany Twins pushing, the FIC got 25 bills passed, entirely recasting the state’s labor laws. Von Drehle explains that two years after the Triangle fire, “nearly every deficiency in the Asch Building had been addressed” (215).
Chapters 7-8 Analysis
In Chapters 7 and 8, Von Drehle examines the aftermath of the Triangle fire, first focusing on the “Fallout”—or the battles over who was to blame for the tragedy—and then on “Reform”—detailing the legislative changes that took place because of it. A week after the fire, a protest rally was held at the Great Hall of the Cooper Union, in which Meyer London, the famed socialist lawyer and future US representative, predicted that there would be an investigation into the fire but that laws coming from it would not be enforced. The mood among labor leaders and progressives was that, as with previous tragedies, lip service would be paid to the need for reform, but it would eventually be forgotten. Much of Von Drehle’s examination of the fallout from the fire in Chapter 7 focuses on how politicians and the media played a role in determining who to blame. He argues that “everyone agreed that something terrible had happened, and nearly everyone at least paid lip-service to the need for a significant response. But there was no consensus as to who had failed, what had gone wrong, or how to fix it” (185).
In Chapter 8, Von Drehle’s examination turns to The Relationship Between Tragedy and Social Reform, as he considers how the shocking nature of this tragedy galvanized progressives and gave rise to alliances that would not otherwise have existed. Throughout the chapter, he introduces several key figures who shaped the fight for workplace safety reforms. These include Frances Perkins, a young intellectual reformer who would later become the first woman to serve in a presidential cabinet, as secretary of labor for Franklin D. Roosevelt from 1933-1945. The reform movement also had a couple of unexpected helpers in state senators, Alfred Smith and Robert F. Wagner. Smith and Wagner—who together became known as the “Tammany Twins”—were unexpected helpers in that Tammany boss Charlie Murphy had bypassed the “old guard” to appoint these young men to run the day-to-day business of the legislature, and in that Tammany Hall had long been known as an obstacle to reform. Von Drehle argues that a generation later, “it would be clear that spotting these two men and elevating them together was Murphy’s greatest achievement” (201). In doing this, Murphy transformed the image of Tammany Hall from one of corruption and graft to one of reform and progress. With Smith and Wagner pushing, the legislature produced a series of workplace safety laws “that was unmatched to that time in American history” (215).
Florence Kelly of the Consumer’s League, who would strongly influence the work of Perkins, was convinced that “if people had enough information about working conditions in the new industrial order, they would demand change” (196). Unfortunately, it took a disaster of the magnitude of the Triangle fire to make most people aware of the unsafe conditions in which millions of New Yorkers worked. As Von Drehle explains throughout his work, the Triangle fire was different from other tragedies because it did lead to reform. Offering the General Slocum riverboat fire of 1904 and the Newark garment fire from just the previous year, he argues that “many times before, a disaster was followed by a predictable train of consequences: shock, then outrage, then resolve, all leading to lip service dwindling into forgetfulness” (172).
