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Triangle Shirtwaist: Remembering the Fire
This week marks the 100th anniversary of the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, a seminal moment in labor history in which 146 garment workers, mostly Jewish and Italian women, were killed in New York City. Many jumped to their deaths after finding the exit doors locked to prevent them from taking breaks. The factory owners escaped; they were acquitted in a criminal trial but lost a civil suit and had to pay $75 a victim. A new film and scores of events in New York and elsewhere by Workers United, descendant of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union. Wisconsin, Michigan, BP, Dream Act: If you think the Triangle issues are in the past, think again.
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35 Comments so far
Show AllAnd the conservatives' battle against working people continues with defunding agencies or re-writing the rules for worker safety. Worker's Compensation claims are aggressively fought by companies big and small, even though the money is already set aside for claims. After all, who profits most from being negligent? The employer, or the employee?
I like the fact that you said "conservatives' rather than Republicans. Bashing workers is a goal that cuts across party lines.
My mother was a baby when this tragic event happened, but she worked in a clothing factory in Illinois twenty-four years later, so what happened to those women in 1911 has had an impact on me since the first time I read about it. Just the thought of those factory owners locking the women in gives me chills. They should have been hung, not acquitted.
Hooray for Workers United. This new brand of Republicans, like Gov. Walker, would probably be all for going back to those days of 1911.
Just the thought of those factory owners locking the women in gives me chills. They should have been hung, not acquitted.
-----------------------------------
Yes, they should have been hanged, or minimally sent to prison for life.
A little-known fact is that a week after the tragedy, those criminals re-opened on the 6th floor in another building, and packed the sewing machines together so densely that escape routes for the workers would have been cut off in the event of another fire.
As I heard it they scooted for Canada!
>^^<
A number of years ago I read a "young adult' genre historical novel about the Triangle Shirtwaist fire to my daughter. As I remember it this particularly story started with a family dispossessed from their home in Ireland, Although given that I have read many historical novels to her, I may be confusing those details with another story. In any case keeping the history and the memory of this particular tragedy alive is important.
This happens today. Meat packers in Arkansaw have been locked in, but they are only Mexicans.
God bless the Workers United.
Yes it does.
"Made In L.A. / Hecho En Los Angeles" by Almudena Carracedo "is an Emmy award-winning feature documentary that follows the remarkable story of three Latina immigrants working in Los Angeles garment sweatshops as they embark on a three-year odyssey to win basic labor protections from a trendy clothing retailer. In intimate verite style [Forever 21],' "A story about immigration, the power of unity, and the courage it takes to find your voice."
www.madeinla.com/
Wal-Mart does that too, to prevent loss. I guess the employees burning up in a fire wouldn't be a loss!
>^^<
Unions, boycotts, protests, and / or the government. What's it going to be?
How do we protect these workers and ourselves?
We need unions that will fight for safe working conditions as well as wages and benefits. Whenever there is an attack on unions, remember these women, or my grandfather who died in a coal mine accident, or my mother who breathed steel wool into her lungs at a factory job and often could not take care of us, or your cousin who fell off a scaffold, or the young girl who lost her health making your clothes in Bangladesh or so many others working in factories, or farms or construction sites.
Today also remember the Japanese workers who volunteered to stay at the reactors to try to contain the radiation. It is likely they will suffer severe health problems down the road. All unions should be fighting for clean enegy and green jobs so their members and the general public will not have to face such situations.
(The unions do not always do their jobs well, but that is another battle.)
I have long disliked the unions in this country, as I believe the perks provided for longevity rather than merit are inappropriate. However, that is an individual union decision, and it should ABSOLUTELY be the right of ANY group of workers to band together to enact change. After all, isn't "majority rule" supposed to be an American institution? I guess for conservatives "majority rule" only applies to whoever has the money and the fancy title. The rest of us shlubs are just cattle to them.
Unions need improvement on the whole, but I don't see how that can happen when they are all too busy trying to fight against the oppressive corporate dynasties.
"...when they are all too busy trying to fight against the oppressive corporate dynasties." Wish that were the reason for the unions' problems.
Glad to hear that, I'm sure you'd go along with my boss, that cronyism topps all! Of course my whimpy union goes quietly along!
>^^<
needless to say I hate my union! not commenting on others..
"We need unions that will fight for safe working conditions as well as wages and benefits......."
BTW, did you read that AT&T merger with T-Mobil and guess what?
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka agrees with the merger. After the merger 30 millions T-Mobile subscribers will be paying 20% more and there will be many jobs loss.
So much for the Unions, Democrats and Obama!
Unions are grass roots organizations with the most potential to stand up for ordinary people. Unlike the money-dominated parties, unions' interests are not intrinsically with the corporations, in fact quite the opposite. It is sad that Trumka and many others have forgotten that, or lack the courage to act on it.
Unless and until the unions regain their class consciousness, and their sense of solidarity with workers here and in all countries, they, and all of us, will inevitably suffer betrayal after betrayal from the politicians and continue their decline. I see glimmers in Wisconsin and elsewhere that the unions recognize that workers are a source of honest and useful enterprise as opposed to financial speculators and such.
But changing unions will not be quick and easy since decades of expelling the left from unions has robbed them of their courage and honesty. Militarism, "security", prisons and the drug trade (legal and illegal), are among the only growing sectors providing employment at this time and in this place, so people who need a weekly paycheck are lulled into accepting these things. If union members and unorganized workers do not make the connections between violence, a toxic environment, plutocracy and the dimming prospects for their children's future, and do not decide to fight back and participate in changing the direction we are taking as a nation, then we have nothing much to look forward to.
Beautifully written all words but no substances. The sooner you and many Americans came to your sense, that the Unions, the Democrats and Obama are no different from Dubya, the Repug and Kohl brothers, there will not be any change.
You and I, together with many here will continue to whine and bitch...
So do you have anything of substance to say about where we go from here? I'm listening.
jclientelle,
To be honest I don't have any alternate. But I can promise you this. Obama next term will be harsher and the unions will continue as before. Did you know just yesterday the AT&T merger with T-Mobil, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka agrees with the merger?
I remember SobaCat posted a few weeks ago, a revolution something like the Egyptian will happen and many will die.
Here is a URL you might wanna go to:
http://www.muckety.com/IMB-HoldCo-LLC/5064189.muckety
Reply to sivasm:
sivasm,
The Muckety website looks interesting. Thanks for posting the link!
Here is the "muckety" link for labor organizations.
www.muckety.com/listings/laborOrganizations.html
Well, if there are no alternatives, then it seems to me that somehow we have to work with what we have which includes changing what we have to work with union-wise, as well as otherwise: including political parties, non-profit organizations, ourselves, whatever. Beyond that we need to create new organizations that serve us better.
My Reply to sivasm:
jclientelle's comments suggest to me that jclientelle has a sensible and realistic perspective on unions.
But the change that we desire will not spontaneously arise out of a sensible and realistic perspective alone. Hard and intelligent work are required to bring about such change.
What happened in Madison, Wisconsin suggests that despite the similarities with Republicans, there are Democrats at least at the state level who can be moved to action more easily than Republicans by massive protests.
That is something important worth noting.
jclientelle's beautiful and well written words just might inspire some folks who read the comments here to further action. Isn't that what solidarity is about?
Certainly, your whining and bitching are unlikely to do so.
Please!!!!!11 unions today are at best the bosses shills, at worst they are the Personel department, keeping the sheep quiet with promises of better next year, stick togther, vote democrat!
>^^<
Yes, RichardsCatz. Seems to me that the complicity of many unions leaders with owners has been a problem since long before the merger of the AFL and CIO.
But unions played an important role in the massive protests in Madison, Wisconsin.
I know you have said several times that you don't like your union or at least its leaders. And you say that there are 11 unions or at least their leaders which you consider at best to be the bosses shills.
So, I'll ask you as well which unions do you believe have the most potential for effective grass roots organizing in the community and in the workplace?
PuffinThrush,
Really? Just yesterday the AT&T merger with T-Mobil, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka agrees with the merger!
I can be promised you and your "jclientelle's beautiful and well written words" that Obama next term will be even harsher, after all he dun needs to face the voter again. Think about it will ya! :-)
sivasm, you are mistaken if you think that I believe that Barack Obama will do anything more than apply window dressing to the White House to help the working class. Even that effort seems more and more to be too much work for him.
As for Richard Trumka, what would you expect from the president of the AFL-CIO?
So, which unions do you believe have the most potential for effective grass roots organizing in the community and in the workplace?
Don't be surprised when corporate media lap dogs try to bury this 'inconvenient' bit of history.
"Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it," and the corporate feudalists are doing their damnest to make sure of it.
I watched this last night. This is 45 minutes that should be required watching in every school in America. In '79 I watched the excellent movie that was made about the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory starring Tovah Feldshuh and never forgot it. I missed the first three minutes of this show but I had a feeling that Feldshuh was the narrator and then I looked it up. This movie has been unavailable on TV and elsewhere pretty much since it aired. There is one DVD available on Amazon and it is listed for $349.
Like I said, this documentary and the interview on Marketplace last night that ties it to the present day should be required viewing and listening.
I remember the TV movie you're referring to. That film could not get made nor aired in today's corporate media environment.
I see mothers when I look at that top picture. Are our overlords any less criminal today? Without regulation, no, they're not.
This catastrophy was brought to us by the Scott Walkers of the world.
Ocean
No NOT "Scott Walkers of the world".
WE did it, cuz we trusted the Unions, Obama and the Democrats. Continue doing the same will get the same results regardless if you did it a million times. Think about it will ya? :-)
sivasm wrote in a comment posted Mar 23 2011 - 8:10am and addressed to jclientelle:
“jclientelle,
To be honest I don't have any alternate. But I can promise you this. Obama next term will be harsher and the unions will continue as before.”
sivasm wrote in a comment addressed to Ocean
“No NOT ‘Scott Walkers of the world’.
WE did it, cuz we trusted the Unions, Obama and the Democrats. Continue doing the same will get the same results regardless if you did it a million times. Think about it will ya? :-) ”
My Reply to sivasm:
Actually, Scott Walker was elected governor of Wisconsin on November 2, 2010, defeating Democratic candidate Tom Barrett, 52 percent to 47 percent, in an election shaped by the so-called “enthusiasm gap”, which arose out of the severe disappointment and distrust that so many people felt about Barack Obama and the Democrats, and because there was no credible alternative on the ballot besides Walker and Barrett, and because Plurality Voting does not permit voters to directly support or oppose individual candidates on the ballot by specifically voting for or against them.
So, Wisconsin got Scott Walker!
These facts would seem to support two conclusions:
1) Until the way we vote is changed so as to genuinely empower voters, voters should be very careful about concluding that there is no lesser of two evils amongst Democrats and Republicans, particularly when there is no recall option, but even when there is a recall option as there is in Wisconsin, because much damage can be done before a governor and complicit legislators can be recalled;
2) Plurality Voting must be replaced with a consent-dissent grading scale based voting procedure like Yes No ‘Maybe So’ Voting or Category Scale Power Voting that genuinely empowers voters by expanding each voters freedom of speech and freedom of political association so that voters can for example express a preference between the two major party candidates without supporting either major party candidate, at the same time that they express their support or opposition for or against any of the other candidates on the ballot.
I think you might agree that not only government, but unions too need to be democratized as well.
We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace: business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism ... they had begun to consider the government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government by organized mob.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, final speech at Madison Square Garden in the presidential campaign, announcing the Second New Deal, 31 October 1936
reprinted in "Whose Crises Whose Future," by Susan George, page 20
From that same speech:
"When they imply that the reserves thus created against both these policies [social security and unemployment comp] will be stolen by some future Congress, diverted to some wholly foreign purpose, they attack the integrity and honor of American Government itself."
Thank you Mathew Scott Fi and Mairead for these two excerpts from FDR's speech at Madison Square Garden on October 31,1936.