Customer Reviews

The Triangle Fire

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4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Once I opened this book, I was hooked. The author's writing style grips you by the throat and drags you along with the survivors and the victims of this horrific yet history-making catastrophe! Every time you go into an office building and see a glowing exit sign, idly note that the doors have crash bars and open into the stairwell, or brush up against a fire extinguisher or hose cabinet, you'll remember why they're now mandated to be there. This disaster should never have happened, and this book explains why and how steps were taken to keep it from happening again. But it is also a book about people--those who made it out alive and those who didn't, and the little choices that made the difference.

Leon Stein had the advantage of speaking with some of the survivors, and he is an excellent conduit through which they tell their story. The strike is covered briefly, but Stein concentrates on the fire and its aftermath, including the gruesome task of identifying the bodies and the mournful series of funerals, culminating in the procession for the unknowns. Read this volume in tandem with David von Drehle's "Triangle: The Fire that Changed America," as they complement each other perfectly.

Leon Stein is a marvelous story-teller, who in THE TRIANGLE FIRE, shows incredible restraint. Given his pro-union, pro-labor background, you can almost hear him checking himself--holding back from screaming at an anti-labor era in America that caused so many needless deaths and injuries. Published on, roughly, the 50th anniversary of the disaster, Stein presents a story of young immigrant girls standing up against sweatshop atrocities, only to find themselves, in the case of the girls laboring at the Triangle Shirtwaist factory, pushed further down. The account of the disaster is appropriately harrowing.

William Greider's introduction, although occassionally heavy-handed, makes the reader wonder how much things have improved now that we are almost marking the 100th anniversary of that awful day.

Also, it would be worthwhile to read this in conjunction with David von Driehle's superb "Triangle: The Fire that Changed America".

Rocco Dormarunno, author of "The Five Points".

I used this book to write a 33 page paper concerning the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union. It is not only fascinating, but the most thorough work on this tragic subject I could find. He is a fantastic author and documentarian.

This book is a very personal and gripping account of the fire on March 25, 1911, at the Triangle Shirtwaist company located on the 8th, 9th, and 10th floors of the Asch building in New York adjacent to Washington Square Park, where 146 young immigrant women were either burned to death or leapt from the ledges of the building. The author had a personal involvement in this event, as he joined the International Ladies Garment Workers' Union in 1928 as a garment cutter before joining the staff of their publication Justice. The book is based primarily on newspaper accounts and interviews of many who experienced that horrific event.

The book is written as if the author was there. The horror of sixty-some people jumping, sometimes in twos. The messiness at the bottom. What befell those caught on the overloaded fire escape as it ripped from the building. He captures the anguish of those identifying bodies at the improvised morgue, those continually walking in the streets - some silently, some crying out - at the scene of the disaster trying to make sense of it all, the huge funeral processions, etc. He tells the remarkable story of the aid rendered by the Red Cross to surviving family members, many of whom as recent arrivees had no place to turn.

He tells the dismal story of ineffectual building code standards and enforcement. The strident efforts of all to avoid blame, especially the factory owners. He tells of the ineffectualness of the shirtwaist makers themselves in trying to improve their working conditions, especially safety concerns, which included a huge city-wide strike at the end of 1909. And then there was the courtroom fiasco - where a shrewd attorney representing the owners implanted the notion that the irrational behavior of the girls during the fire had more to do with their deaths than the narrow escape stairways, the locked doors blocking access, the lack of properly constructed fire escapes, and most importantly the lack of a sprinkler system - a sad day for American justice. Both the insurance industry and owners preferred a system whereby high premiums were paid instead of requiring safety provisions and paying lower premiums. The Triangle owners did collect a large sum of money from the fire.

This book and the notes of the author were also prime material for a book written forty years later, Triangle, The Fire That Changed America by David Von Drehle. That book is better organized and puts the fire into the context of the times, including overall living conditions of immigrants, the political dominance of Tammany Hall, the Democratic machine, and reform efforts in the New York legislature. But that book lacks the emotional appeal of this work. It was moving to read of the Fiftieth Anniversary Memorial Meeting sponsored by the ILGWU, NYU, and the NYFD on March 25, 1961, with special guests Eleanor Roosevelt, Frances Perkins (FDR's Sec of Labor), and Rose Schneiderman (labor activist at the time of the fire), where 14 survivors attended including three who saved themselves by leaping down an elevator shaft on that fateful day, but had not seen each other since then. The author dedicated his book to the unidentified in coffins numbered 46, 50, 61, 95, 103, 115, and 127.

As a Professor of Fire Science I am constantly seeking out books having to do with great historical fires in American. These books are to be used as course research papers by my students and typically are not available via the library network. I trust many of my students are buying their copies from Amazon.com a name that can be trusted.

We are now approaching the hundreth anniversary of the Triange Fire, and, as with all historical events, time is slowly wiping out evidence it ever happened. The last survivor died a very old woman in 2001, just months before victims would jump from another city high rise. Stein's book came out about a half century ago, and has been the primary reference since then, or at least until Von Drehle's five years ago.

Stein does a fine job of giving the reader an overview of the 1911 story. Although a labor activist, he does not soak the book in union vemon, but describes the event in the detached manner of a newsman. The fire itself is described in the first half.

I don't agree with the reviewer whose 'half baked' review labeled part two as a yawn. The trial section is actually quite fascinating, and brings the reader into the minds of the victims struggling against a critical locked door.

Finally, I must mention that I found condemnation of the buidlings owners not wholly appropriate. Workers at the Ash building were poor young women who often spoke no English and had few prospects for making a living. A job in a 'sweatshop' doesn't sound so bad in that light.

I read an older edition of this book when I was in college. Of all the books I have ever read, this one had the most profound impact on my life...and political views. (In fact, roughly 15 years after first reading this book, I spent a lot of time searching hard-to-find titles on the internet for a copy to own.)

I still remember reading this in the college library, with tears of utter horror and sadness streaming down my face. We are quite fortunate to have the kinds of labor laws and fire safety regulations we have today.

I just finished reading this book in order to gain more back ground information for a paper I am in the midst of writing. Stein has included an enormous amount of very detailed information about the fire, as well as many of its implications. This book proved to be a very useful tool for my paper--I highly recommend it for anyone who wishes to study the tragedy more in depth.

I teach fire history and I found the book to be an invaluable resource highlighting one of Americas worst tragedies. I would highly recommend it for both those with a passion for history and for fire buffs.