Triangle: The Fire That Changed America

“Busting up strikes was a lucrative sideline for downtown gangsters. So-called detective agencies were constantly looking for strikebreaking contracts from worried bosses in shops where there was unrest.”

In Chapter 1, Von Drehle discusses Clara Lemlich, a Ukrainian immigrant and labor activist, who was severely beaten for her activity in leading a strike at the factory where she worked. The men who beat Lemlich were paid to do so by factory owners. That this cottage industry in violence existed is a testament to the lack of protections for workers in this era.

“From the summer of 1909 to the end of 1911, New York waist makers—young women, mostly immigrants—achieved something profound. They were a catalyst for the forces of change: the drive for women’s rights (and other civil rights), the rise of unions, and the use of activist government to address social problems.”

Clara Lemlich and other young women like her were catalysts not only for organized labor and reforms within the garment industry but for other social problems as well. They were the foundation of the progressive movement in the early part of the 20th century, a movement that supported the vote for women, protection for consumers and workers, and trade unionism (20).

“Progress had its own political movement: progressivism, a gospel of the new and improved. Progressives supported the vote for women, protection for consumers and workers, trade unionism. More than any platform, though, progressivism was a mind-set. It was pragmatic and scientific. Progressives took the tools of engineers and turned them to the new fields of social work and socially conscious politics.”

In Chapter 1, Von Drehle also discusses Tammany Hall, the corrupt political machine that had dominated New York since the mid-19th century. He contrasts the liberal policies supported by progressives with the conservative policies supported by Tammany Hall.

“A Strike fixes a simple template over the often complicated structure of life, dividing the world sharply into workers and bosses. Choosing sides—labor’s side or the side of the bosses—was a familiar part of Lower East Side existence.”

To begin Chapter 2, Von Drehle uses an anecdote concerning an incident at the Triangle Waist Company in 1908, in which a worker was violently dragged from the shop for protesting his low pay. This led to a brief walkout of other workers, but it did not last into the following week. A year later, however, as strikes were going on at other factories in the area, a strike finally occurred at Triangle.

“The sweatshops broke the spirit of many women and men, and drove countless workers into early graves. Tuberculosis spread so easily among the exhausted laborers in the cramped, poorly ventilated shops that it was known as ‘the tailors’ disease’ or ‘the Jewish disease.’”

Before garment manufacturing became common in factories—often in lofts of skyscraper buildings—factory owners farmed out most of their work to independent contractors, each of whom handled just one step in the manufacturing process. These contractors typically operated what were known as sweatshops in tiny rooms of tenement buildings, where they crammed numerous workers together for very long hours without proper accommodation. Similar practices remain common in the garment industry today, as US companies have moved their manufacturing overseas in search of cheaper labor.

“The rise of Blanck and Harris coincided precisely with the maturing of the garment industry. Between the time they entered the business and their arrival at the top, the amount spent each year by Americans on ready-to-wear clothing roughly tripled, to $1.3 billion (equal to about $23 billion today). This could have never happened without modern factories.”

In 1900, Harris and Blanck’s company, the Triangle Waist Company, was located in a small shop on Wooster Street. According to Von Drehle, “[T]hey knew the waist craze was a rare opportunity and were determined to seize it,” so they began looking for more space (46). Two years later, they relocated to 27 Washington Place, on the ninth floor of the Asch Building, a new skyscraper (46). By 1909, Triangle had expanded to include all three of the top floors of the building (47).

“Roughly five hundred shops were hit by the waist makers’ strike. More than seventy owners—roughly one in seven—surrendered in the first forty-eight hours. They were smaller shops, less able to endure a long stoppage. Their workers returned immediately, having won a pay raise, a fifty-two hours week, and a pledge to run a union-only factory.”

Chapter 3 examined the shirtwaist makers’ strike of 1909 and 1910, which came to be known as the Uprising of the 20,000. Von Drehle explains that while owners of large factories, such as Blanck and Harris of the Triangle, were able to resist the strikers’ demands by hiring scabs to continue production on a smaller scale, the owners of small shops were less able to adapt, and most acceded to the demands during the first two days.

“Pro-strike sentiment spread up and down the East Coast, carried by WTUL volunteers who traveled relentlessly to address crowds in churches, union halls, and college lecture rooms. Even Helen Taft, daughter of President William Howard Taft, attended a meeting to support the uprising.”

As the strike continued, strikers gained more and more public support and sympathy. One of the pivotal moments in the strike came when wealthy, progressive society women joined the cause. Among these, Alva Smith Vanderbilt Belmont, Anne Morgan (daughter of J. P. Morgan), and Helen Taft were included.

“Ultimately, the strike belonged to the waist makers and to their crowded little world on the East Side (and, to a lesser extent, to their counterparts in Philadelphia). The last few thousand strikers from the large, unyielding firms stayed in the streets for six long weeks after the heady days of late December. Their resistance took on a more homely quality compared with the benefit concerts and mass rallies and motor parades.”

When wealthy progressive women such as Belmont, Morgan, and Taft joined the strikers’ cause, one of the key questions that arose was to whom the strike belonged. While the help of the society women was instrumental in shaping public opinion, some of the working-class union women came to resent the attention they were receiving.

“About 60 percent of the Triangle workers, along with management and, of course, the owners, were Eastern European Jews. Most of the rest came from Italy, part of a migration even larger than the Jewish exodus.”

In Chapter 4, Von Drehle examines the lives of some of the Triangle workers who died in the fire. In doing this, he explains that almost all were immigrants who had come to America from either Eastern Europe or Italy. While the young women who comprised the workforce had this in common, the cultural aspects of their lives and their expected gender roles within their families and communities were quite different.

“The day had turned out to be quite lovely and springlike. Hundreds of New Yorkers were enjoying the late afternoon in the simple symmetry of Washington Square, with its curving walks and its canopy of budding trees. This attractive little park, once a pauper’s graveyard, was cheerful with the stewpot mélange of humanity that has long made New York so attractive to some people and so unnerving to others.”

In Chapter 5, Von Drehle juxtaposes the horror inside the Triangle factory against the tranquility outside, among the hundreds of people nearby who had no idea. Eventually, passersby realized what was going on and a crowd began to gather on the streets below.

“The sheer speed of it must be kept in mind. All the crucial things that happened inside the factory that awful afternoon—the heroics, the terror, the tragedy, the strokes of fortune both saving and deadly—transpired in a handful of minutes and in the presence of a hideously voracious fire.”

Von Drehle is referring to the speed with which the fire spread and the entire tragedy transpired. The fire was first spotted on the eighth floor at 4:40 pm., the first call to the fire stations went out at 4:45 pm, the last body fell from the ninth-floor windows at 4:57 pm, and by just after 5:00 pm, firefighters had the blaze under control.

“People survived thanks to a short head start, or a seat assignment near an exit, or by following the right mad rush in one direction or another—or by ignoring the wrong rush. They survived by acting a bit more quickly, or boldly, or brutally. But the truth is that most people working on the ninth floor that day did not survive at all.”

Von Drehle titled Chapter 6 “Three Minutes” because “if the workers on the ninth floor had been warned of the fire at 4:42 P.M. instead of 4:45, every one of them might have been saved” (159). It is also true that survival that day came down to a combination of luck and brutality, the willingness to push someone aside to get out. The author uses several testimonies of Triangle workers who were fortunate in that they got an early start on quitting time and thus were already on their way out when the blaze started.

“This, then, was their universe: panic and fire behind them, horror and helplessness on the faces far, far below—and something cool, something beautiful, just out of reach beyond the heat waves and the blinding smoke.”

Von Drehle is referring to what the workers on the ninth floor were looking at as they stood at the windows. The fire department had arrived moments before, and the trapped workers could see the people on the street below shouting to not jump and that help was on the way, but the fire truck’s ladders when fully extended were still 30 feet below them.

“These victims did not choose to jump. They avoided every variety of death until there was nowhere else to go. They retreated from the flames as a matter of reflex and instinct; they tried to stay in the loft even as they began to burn. Finally, the impulse to retreat overwhelmed everything else and they tumbled through the windows in horrible heaps.”

Once again, Von Drehle is referring to the scores of people who died that day by jumping to their deaths rather than burning. He asserts that, in many cases, this was not a choice but a reflex to avoid the flames at any cost. The author also suggests that “perhaps there was also an element of self-determination in the decision, a desire to assert a last grim sliver of control” (155). The helplessness of these trapped workers inspired activists to assert political control in the disaster’s aftermath, to prevent a similar disaster from ever occurring again.

“Some of those who witnessed the tragedy were struck by the impotence of the fire department, which seemingly did nothing to save the trapped workers.”

In Chapter 7, Von Drehle examines the fallout from the fire, which largely amounted to the owners, media, and politicians attempting to escape blame and point the finger at someone else. Although many thought that the fire department should have done more, District Attorney Whitman knew that it would not be wise to blame them because of their popularity. Others thought that the politicians behind the building codes should be blamed, and still others blamed Blanck and Harris when they heard about the fire escape and locked doors.

“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.”

Newspapers played a crucial role in shaping opinion about who to blame for the fire and what to do to prevent future tragedies, and they all had varying opinions. Whereas the Times opined that “no new laws are needed,” and the World called for a raft of new laws, the socialist Call went after Blanck and Harris specifically (185).

“Since the Tweed era in the 1860s and 1870s, the words ‘Tammany Hall’ had been synonymous with graft, corruption, and the election of puppets to do the work of dishonest bosses. That ignominy was largely deserved, but with the installation of Smith and Wagner in the first days of 1911, Charles Murphy promoted the leadership that would move Tammany into an era of change, an era of reform.”

In Chapter 8, Von Drehle discusses the reforms that took place after the Triangle fire. This was surprising not only because reforms did not take place following previous tragedies, but also because reform was the opposite of what Tammany Hall had become known for. However, Tammany largely made the reforms happen after the fire.

“What happened at the Triangle was outrageous—this was undeniable and beyond politics. It was preventable, but it happened anyway because of complacency and greed.”

Shortly after the fire, progressives and socialists called a meeting at the Metropolitan Opera House to discuss reforms. One of those who spoke was Rose Schneiderman of the Women’s Trade Union League. Her speech was full of anger and rage, and it mobilized the group to form a committee on safety, which eventually morphed into the Factory Investigating Commission.

“The work of 1912 produced a series of new laws in the 1913 legislature that was unmatched at that time in American history. The Tammany Twins pushed through 25 bills, entirely recasting the labor law of the nation’s largest state.”

Von Drehle adds that “nearly every deficiency in the Asch Building had been addressed” (215). In addition to automatic sprinklers being required in high-rise buildings, fire drills were now mandatory in large shops and doors had to remain unlocked and swing outward. All of the reform laws were made possible not just by progressives like Frances Perkins but also by the Tammany Twins, Al Smith and Robert Wagner.

“The utter destruction of a United States congressman and potential governor had taken Max Steuer less than an hour. What might he do with immigrant teenagers?”

In this passage, Von Drehle is referring to a previous trial, just prior to the Triangle case, in which Max Steuer defended a former state senator accused of taking bribes. One of the key witnesses against the defendant was a sitting congressman with a bright political future ahead of him. Steuer dug up dirt on the witness concerning a fraudulent test score and raised it in cross-examination, upending his testimony and destroying his career.

“The Triangle fire had been replayed as tragedy, as destiny, as horror story, and as potential catalyst. Now it would be examined once more, as a question of justice: Was it right to hold anyone personally responsible? And if it was right, was it possible?”

The Triangle fire had been examined in several ways through various newspapers, but looming questions about responsibility remained. Von Drehle’s rhetorical questions point to a troubling political reality: Even if Blanck and Harris were largely to blame for the disaster, their wealth and political connections might make it impossible to hold them accountable.

“He enforced rules that drained the trial of the full horrific details of the Triangle disaster and issued jury instructions that essentially made it impossible to convict the owners. Because of his own experience, the judge sympathized more with the defendants than with the victims of the Triangle fire.”

Von Drehle refers to the rulings of Judge Thomas C. T. Crain, prohibiting testimony concerning people jumping from the windows and instructing the jury that they must find that the owners knew the doors were locked. At the end of Chapter 9, Von Drehle explains that Crain himself, when he was commissioner of the Tenement House Department, faced charges that he was responsible for a deadly tenement fire.