Today is the 107th anniversary of the 1911 fire at the Shirtwaist Factory in New York. 146 garment workers died because the owners locked doors to stairwells and exits to prevent unauthorized breaks and to reduce theft. (Bags were checked upon exit.) How do I know this? It was part of my research for THE LATECOMERS. Several scenes are set at the Shirtwaist Factory, now a building owned by New York University. My research included old newspaper accounts, but the most gut-wrenching account came from a book titled THE LIFE STORIES OF UNDISTINGUISHED AMERICANS AS TOLD BY THEMSELVES, published in 1906, edited by Hamilton Holt.
Here’s a quote from a Polish immigrant girl:
The machines go like mad all day, because the faster you work the more money you get. Sometimes in my haste I get my finger caught and the needle goes right through it. It goes so quick, though, that it does not hurt much. I bind the finger up with a piece of cotton and go on working. We all have accidents like that. Where the needle goes through the nail it makes a sore finger, or where it splinters a bone it does much harm. Sometimes a finger has to come off. Generally, though, one can be cured by a salve. All the time we are working the boss walks about examining the finished garments and making us do them over again if they are not just right. So we have to be careful as well as swift. But I am getting so good at the work that within a year I will be making $7 a week, and then I can save at least $3.50 a week. I have over $200 saved now.–
What were shirtwaists and why were so many being produced? At the turn of the other century, the shirtwaist blouse was a wardrobe game changer. It was a button-down blouse, originally modeled on menswear shirts. Fashionably tucked into the waistband of a skirt, it set young women apart from their elders who wore only dresses.
The Shirtwaist Factory fire spawned the rise of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU) which would help protect the rights and safety of those who worked for companies in the garment industry. In light of what happened 107 years ago today, it’s sad that our current administration is rolling back so many protections for workers.
image via vintagevictorian.com