On March 25, 1911, a fire broke out on the eighth floor of the Asch Building in Manhattan's Greenwich Village. The Triangle Shirtwaist Company occupied the top three floors, employing mostly young immigrant women making women's blouses. Within 18 minutes, 146 workers were dead - trapped by locked doors meant to prevent theft and unauthorized breaks, killed by flames or by the desperate choice to jump from windows 100 feet above the street. The fire escapes were inadequate; the fire hoses couldn't reach above the sixth floor. The tragedy galvanized the labor movement and transformed American workplace safety laws. The building still stands, now part of NYU, the site marked by memorial plaques.
The Triangle Shirtwaist Company employed about 500 workers making women's blouses - 'shirtwaists' - a popular garment of the era. Most workers were immigrant women, primarily Jewish and Italian, many teenagers. Working conditions were harsh: 52-hour weeks, low pay, supervisors who searched workers leaving to prevent theft. The owners, Max Blanck and Isaac Harris, had faced strikes in 1909-1910, the 'Uprising of 20,000,' but resisted unionization. The factory occupied floors eight through ten of the Asch Building, a ten-story structure completed in 1901. The building was fireproof. The contents were not.
The fire started in a bin of fabric scraps on the eighth floor around 4:40 PM - likely from a discarded cigarette or match. The flammable fabric, the wooden tables, the tissue paper patterns - everything burned. Workers on the tenth floor received warning by telephone; most escaped to the roof, where NYU students helped them to safety. The eighth and ninth floors received no warning. The door to one stairway was locked. The fire escape collapsed under the weight of fleeing workers. The elevators made several trips before the shafts filled with smoke. Those who couldn't escape faced flames or the long fall to the street.
Witnesses on the street watched in horror as workers appeared at windows, climbed onto sills, and jumped. Some fell singly; others in groups, holding hands. Fire nets proved useless - the bodies fell too fast, from too high. At least 62 people died from jumping or falling. The bodies accumulated on the sidewalk. Frances Perkins, later FDR's Secretary of Labor, witnessed the scene and devoted her career to worker safety. The falling women became the enduring image of the disaster - people forced to choose between burning and falling, with no third option because the exits were locked.
The owners, Blanck and Harris, were tried for manslaughter and acquitted - the jury couldn't prove they knew the doors were locked. They later settled civil suits for $75 per victim. But public outrage demanded systemic change. New York established the Factory Investigating Commission, which over four years proposed legislation transforming workplace safety. Frances Perkins served on the commission; her work there led eventually to the New Deal's labor reforms. The International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union grew in strength. The building codes, fire codes, and labor laws we consider basic protections emerged from 146 deaths on a Saturday afternoon.
The Asch Building still stands at 23-29 Washington Place in Manhattan's Greenwich Village, now the Brown Building of Science, part of New York University. The building's exterior is largely unchanged. A plaque near the entrance commemorates the victims; the building was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1991. The Corner of Wooster Street and Washington Place, where many victims fell, is marked by a small memorial park. The Remember the Triangle Fire Coalition organizes annual commemorations on March 25. The site is a working university building, not a museum - the tragedy is memorialized but the space is used. The experience is quieter than many expect: a building that still stands, streets that look ordinary, where 146 people died because the exits were locked.
Located at 40.73°N, 73.99°W in Manhattan's Greenwich Village, near Washington Square Park. From altitude, the site is indistinguishable from surrounding buildings - the Brown Building (formerly Asch Building) appears as one structure among many in the dense urban grid. Washington Square Park lies immediately to the north. The building's top floors, where 146 workers died, are visible but unremarkable from above. What appears from altitude as ordinary Manhattan real estate was the site of the deadliest industrial disaster in New York City history - and the catalyst for workplace safety reforms that protect workers throughout America today.