Building Interior After the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire
3/25/1911
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On March 25, 1911, a fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory on New York City‘s East Side killed 146 young immigrant workers. The building, which was ten stories high, was overcrowded and filled with flammable material.
The fire started in a wastebasket on the eighth floor, and the flames jumped up onto the paper patterns that were hanging from the ceiling. Locked doors kept the workers from escaping; there was not enough water to put out the flames, and firemen’s ladders were too short to reach the upper stories. Many of the young women and men working there leapt out the windows and fell to their deaths onto the sidewalk outside. Others were crushed in the elevator shaft or when the fire escape collapsed.
Protests after the fire led New York State to revamp laws governing working conditions, increase the number of fire inspectors, and write new fire safety codes.
The fire started in a wastebasket on the eighth floor, and the flames jumped up onto the paper patterns that were hanging from the ceiling. Locked doors kept the workers from escaping; there was not enough water to put out the flames, and firemen’s ladders were too short to reach the upper stories. Many of the young women and men working there leapt out the windows and fell to their deaths onto the sidewalk outside. Others were crushed in the elevator shaft or when the fire escape collapsed.
Protests after the fire led New York State to revamp laws governing working conditions, increase the number of fire inspectors, and write new fire safety codes.
This primary source comes from the Collection FDR-Photos: Franklin D. Roosevelt Library Photographs.
National Archives Identifier: 6040082
Full Citation: Photograph of the Building Interior after the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire; 3/25/1911; Photographs from the Depression and World War II, 1870 - 2004; Collection FDR-Photos: Franklin D. Roosevelt Library Photographs; Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY. [Online Version, https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/building-interior-triangle-shirtwaist-factory-fire, June 14, 2025]Activities that use this document
- Analyzing Photographs of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire
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