Triangle Fire Memorial

Triangle Fire Memorial. . , On the afternoon of March 25, 1911, 146 workers at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory died here in the space of 15 minutes. Most of them were immigrants or the children of immigrants. Nearly all of them were women or girls. They died from smoke and fire, huddled under the workbenches or trying to break down the doors the factory owners had locked against them. They died leaping from windows on the ninth floor, falling so hard they smashed through the sidewalk beneath your feet. They died trying to save one another. They died from the cruel indifference of their bosses and from the negligence of the city authorities. They died with their sisters, their mothers, their daughters, their brothers. But they did not die in vain. Their deaths inspired a renewed fight for social justice, a struggle for worker rights and safety that would transform America. This memorial inscribes the names of those who died on that long ago afternoon, and honors their memory. But it is also dedicated to the survivors and the witnesses, and to all those who took up the fight for basic human dignity in the workplace, and those who do so to this day.