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About This Website Though titled 'Photos From the Triangle Factory Fire', the purpose of this website is not to display photographs or to make available a large quantity of visual resources. Instead the site focuses on only a small collection of photographs, which I attempt to analyse in some depth. The aim of these analyses is two-fold: Firstly, to highlight ways in which historians can analyse and make use of photographic evidence, and how these photographs in particular can work in dialogue with textual sources on the Triangle Fire. Secondly, to create an awareness of the potential interpretations that these photographs could have, and how they can incorporated into different narratives, like the Triangle Fire itself. In other words, to move away from looking at the history of Triangle Fire as a discrete and singular narrative, and instead see it as a multiple narrative with many overlapping and at times contesting and contradictory strands. The Collections page is a starting point for exploring the photographs and the various analyses. Those wishing to pursue further research can find information on both conventional texts and websites at the Resources and Links section. A Sitemap allows you to jump directly to any page within the site; the Credits page explains further about how this project came about; and the Home link takes you back to the beginning. For those unfamiliar with the circumstances of the Triangle Fire, a short history is provided below. It covers only the general sequence of events and some background information on the Triangle Shirtwaist Company.
Short History of The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire The Triangle Shirtwaist Company was located on the top floors of 23 Washington Place, on the corner with Green St. It was one of the largest manufacturers of shirtwaists in New York in the early years of the twentieth century. (A 'shirtwaist' is a woman's blouse, resembling a shirt.) Owned by Max Blanck and Isaac Harris, the company employed over five hundred workers, mostly women though there was a small number of men. The workers were young - most were in their late teens and early twenties - and almost all were recent immigrants, primarily of Russian Jewish and Italian descent, though some were also Hungarian and German. At 4:30 pm on Saturday March 25, 1911, a fire broke out on level 8 of the Triangle factory, almost certainly due to a cloth scraps catching alight from a cigarette stub. The fire quickly spread through the crowded workshops, fuelled by the cloth from the garments, and up to levels 9 and 10. There were no sprinklers, and no regular fire drills; and moreover the factory doors had been locked from the outside by the factory owners, in order to make sure workers did not slip away during working hours. 500 workers were in the factory at the time of the fire. Of those workers, 146 died - they were burned or suffocated, or jumped. Fire engines that arrived on the scene were mostly ineffective: their ladders and hoses reached only to level 6. The crowd that quickly gathered were horrified as girls began to jump from the windows. Those who leapt rarely survived, as the impact of their falls broke firemen's nets and blankets. The crowd shouted at them not to jump, but for many there was no other means of escape. The one exterior fire escape, located on Greene Street, had collapsed, and the internal stairs were blocked by fire. Within half an hour, the fire had burnt itself out. Afterwards, it could be seen that the building itself was quite undamaged - it had in fact been earlier declared 'fireproof' by inspectors and so it was, apart from its interiors. The public was outraged and horrified by the terrible tragedy - an estimated 120,000 people turned out for the funeral march, with thousands more watching on. Anger was particularly directed at the fact that the suffering and loss of life could have been prevented by better legislation or stricter workplace standards. The formation of the State Factory Investigation Committee was a direct result of the Triangle Fire. In April 1911, Harris and Blanck were indicted on manslaughter charges. Their trial began on December 4 and lasted over three weeks - they were acquitted. Protests caused a second trial on new manslaughter charged to be initiated. This time the judge ordered that they be acquitted without trial, on the grounds that the offense was the same as that in the last trial. The Triangle Fire is still commemorated each year, and remembered as one of the great tragedies of early industrialised America. However, not all remember the Fire for the same reasons or in the same way - for in time the tragedy has become incorporated into several historical narratives. Amongst those are that of the union campaign for better workplace conditions; the feminist narrative of the struggle for women wage earners in America; and the immigrant narrative of new Americans and their social and economic place in New York at the turn of the century. It is these narratives, their overlaps and contradictions, that this website attempts to explore through the photographs available on this site. Further general information on the Triangle Factory Fire can be found in the sites and books listed in the Resources section.
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