The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire and its Legacy
Deadly Factory Fire | Investigation | Impact | Additional Resources
Impact
Between 1911 and 1915, the Factory Investigating Commission studied factory sanitary and safety conditions, wages, and other related issues such as living conditions of workers. The Commission appointed directors for each investigation, and field agents, including Frances Perkins, were hired to carry out on-site inspections of factories and other work sites.
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Three men and three women stand at tables in the finishing room at the Fulton Street plant of Union Mills, an underwear manufacturer in Hudson, New York. Although a fire pail hangs on the far wall, stacks of boxes block aisles, creating a fire hazard.
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Three male workers feed cotton into machines in the carding room of the Washington St. plant of Union Mills, a men's underwear manufacturer located in Hudson, New York. One of the men holds a broom for sweeping the excess off the floor. The investigator noted that "owing to the absence of ducts and hoods the whole room is so filled with floss that it is difficult to see." The cotton in the air and on the floor was noted as a dangerous fire hazard.
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Two girls stand in the vicinity of the toilets at Union Mills, a men's underwear factory on Fulton St. in Hudson, New York. At the right are the doors to the toilets, which an investigator described as "filthy, foul-smelling water closets." The investigator also noted that "the young girl in the cage at the left works within five feet of these closets all day."
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Interior view of factory room. Workmen pose next to pallets of material and a large, wooden tub possibly used for cleaning or dying the material. The men are in shirt sleeves and wear aprons wet with liquid from the tub.
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Interior view of female workers' housing. An elaborately carved chest stands against the wall to the left. On its right, a bed appears through a doorway to a small room. Above the bed, some of the plaster has come off the wall, revealing boards. To the right of the doorway to the bedroom are two wooden chairs. An oval washtub hangs from the wall in the corner. On the right wall is an entrance door. To the right of the door, a tall, narrow piece of furniture is covered with patterned cloth. On the wall above hang a large painting of the Holy Family and a smaller print of figures in more contemporary clothing, both in elaborate frames.
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Four hundred men were employed to work in this sizing room at the Waring Hat Manufacturing Co.'s Vark St. plant in Yonkers, New York. According to the investigator, "Owing to insufficient and improper methods of ventilation this room is excessively hot and the humidity is intense." Machinery and men crowd the room. Several figures in the photograph are blurred or transparent. A disembodied hand and arm appear resting on a lower rung of a ladder in the background on the right side of the photograph.
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Interior of machine room at what is probably International Harvester Co. in Auburn, N.Y. Large piles of hemp lie on the floor. Two men pose for the camera. A fire extinguisher and fire pail hang on a pillar in the center of the photograph. A black box mounted on a pillar to the left is labeled "Fire Box No 16," and on the same pillar a danger sign is posted.
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Men work at machines used for finishing hats at the Waring Hat Manufacturing Co.'s Vark St. plant in Yonkers, New York. Most of the men are sitting on wooden benches. Ducts, fans, and belts appear overhead in the background. The investigator noted that a good system of ducts and fans eliminates dust in this room.
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This committee inspected 3,385 locations in 1911 and 1912, including meat packaging plants, bakeries, clothing manufacturers, chemical plants, and lead trade manufacturing plants. It also held public hearings and authored several reports from the information collected by field agents, businessmen, labor leaders, and local government officials, including two major reports on sanitary conditions and fire hazards in factory establishments. Inspections revealed such problems as inadequacies in ventilation and lighting, unsanitary work areas and eating facilities, lack of stairwells and exits, and absence of proper fire controls such as alarm systems and automatic sprinklers.
Prior to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in 1911, Frances Perkins was already recognized as a social reformer and expert on the health and safety of industrial workers. Following the fire, she served as Executive Secretary of the New York City Committee on Safety and led a team of investigators in a study of fire hazards in mercantile establishments. She contributed expert testimony and authored an extensive report on the subject that was included in the Factory Investigating Commission's third report in 1914. Along with Robert F. Wagner, Alfred E. Smith, and Samuel Gompers, Perkins is credited with helping the commission succeed securing passage of numerous reform measures. A revered expert on industrial policy and labor relations, she later served on the state's Industrial Commission and chaired the state's Industrial Board. In 1929, Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Perkins to head the state's Department of Labor as industrial commissioner. When Roosevelt assumed the presidency in 1933, he appointed Perkins secretary of labor, making her the first female cabinet member in the nation's history.
This image is available from the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division
Time card shows hours worked for two weeks by Miss Jennie Hackemaus [sic] in a fruit cannery dated June 26, 1911. She worked 166 hours for the two weeks, earning $16.60. Accompanying information summarizes daily hours for first week and totals hours for the first week as 117.5 with the average wage at $0.10/hr.
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A woman pulls two metal hampers of hemp down an aisle between machinery at the International Harvester Co. in Auburn, New York. The factory superintendent told the investigator that women had recently been ordered not to handle hampers, but the investigator saw this woman pulling two hampers at once.
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Two workers pose next to textile machinery lacking protective guards in a factory.
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While the Commission's early investigations focused on working conditions and safety hazards, by 1913 its work had broadened to include studies of the conditions and effects of factory labor on working class New Yorkers. One of the Commission's most significant achievements was a series of in-depth studies it conducted on such issues as child labor, the state's Labor Law, and the adequacy of wages paid to factory workers in New York City and in communities across Upstate New York. While the Commission found that too many women and minors received a wage too low to maintain a decent standard of living, its recommendations to create minimum wage legislation and to recodify the Labor Law were rejected by the State Legislature. Nevertheless, the Commission was directly responsible for the passage of a number of laws, including laws prohibiting employment of children under age 14 from working in canneries or tenements; curtailing the number of hours per week that women and children could work in factories and manufacturing establishments; prohibiting employees from smoking in factories; and requiring proper fire prevention and control systems like alarms and fire drills, automatic sprinklers, and fire escapes to be in place in order to prevent future disasters from occurring.
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