The Triangle Fire

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Once upon a time, there were no labor

laws…

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…and people died.

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How do today’s labor laws protect you?

• Please take a moment to write down 3 ways that labor laws protect you.

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Let’s look at history…• The Triangle Shirtwaist

Fire – It was a warm spring

Saturday in New York City, March 25, 1911.  On the top three floors of the ten-story Building of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory workers were getting ready to leave for the day.

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• Most of the several hundred Triangle Shirtwaist employees were teenage girls. 

• Most were recent immigrants. 

• Many spoke only a little English.

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• All of a sudden, somebody on the eighth floor shouted, "Fire!"  Flames leapt from discarded rags between rows of cutting tables in the hundred- foot-by-hundred-foot floor.

• Workers scrambled to escape, but a side door

was locked, blocking their exit.

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• Rickety fire escapes and poorly functioning elevators were the workers’ only way to get out of the burning building.

• Many jumped to their death.

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• It took only eighteen minutes to bring the fire under control, and in ten minutes more it was practically "all over." 

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Water soaked a pile of thirty or more bodies on the Greene Street sidewalk. 

Doctors pawed through heaps of humanity looking for signs of life. 

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Police tried desperately to keep crowds of hysterical relatives from

overrunning the disaster scene.

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• In the hell on the ninth-floor, 145 employees, mostly young women,

would die.

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Honoring the Dead…

• The best way to honor the victims, was to make sure this never happens again.

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New York State Labor Laws

• Were created to protect you from harm at the workplace.

• Govern workspace, numbers, equipment, hiring practices, time, pay and grievances.

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Assignment• Explore the following websites to find out more

about the Triangle Fire. • http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/trianglefire/

http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/pinsky/triangle.htmhttp://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1416870http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/triangle/trianglefire.html

– What were the legal issues involved in the law suits that followed the tragedy?

– What were the outcomes of the trials?– How did New York State Labor laws

change as a result of this tragedy?