March 25, 1911
Within 18 minutes, 147 people, mostly Italian & Jewish immigrant women and girls working in sweatshop conditions, died when the Triangle Shirt Waist Factory, occupying the top floors of a ten-story building on New York’s Lower East Side, was consumed by fire. Approximately 50 died as they jumped from windows to the street; others were burned or trampled to death, desperately trying to escape via illegally locked stairway exits. The incident was a turning point in labor law, especially concerning health and safety.
