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"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breath free."
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They came in droves, driven by the American dream.
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Some would find their dreams,
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while others would struggle to survive as the new American underclass: the industrial working poor.
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Many young immigrant girls found work in New York City's blooming garment industry.
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They faced low wages, excessively long hours, and unsanitary and dangerous working conditions.
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The unluckiest of them all were the workers of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory,
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who would see their American dream burst into horrifying flames.
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This is their story.
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The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory was a typical sweatshop in the heart of Manhattan in the early 1900s.
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The company employed approximately 500 workers, mostly young immigrant women,
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some as young as 13.
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Employees usually worked a 14 hour shift, 6 days a week, and earned $6 to $7 a week.
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Clara Lemlich, 1859: "The regular work pays about $6 a week
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and the girls have to be at the machines at 7 o'clock in the morning.
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And they stayed at them until 8 o'clock at night with just one half-hour lunch in that time
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In the beginning of every slow season $2 was deducted from our salaries.
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We have never been able to find out what this is for."
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Narrator: As difficult as the hours and the pay were, the working conditions were worse.
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Wirt Sikes, 1868: "This is the workroom. How foul the smells! There is no attempt at ventilation.
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The room is crowded with girls and women,
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most of whom are pale and attenuated and are being robbed of life slowly and surely.
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The rose, which should bloom in their cheeks, has vanished long ago; the sparkle has gone out of their eyes.
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They bend over their work with aching backs and throbbing brows, sharp pains dart through their eyeballs.
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They breathe an atmosphere of death. The madame pays her girls $4 a week.
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She herself is in as fine a style as the richest lady she serves."
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Narrator: In 1909, a massive strike organized by the workers asked for safer working conditions and better pay.
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The Triangle Shirtwaist company refused to sign the agreement.
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It was a warm Saturday afternoon on March 25th, 1911.
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The employees of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory raced to finish their work with only 15 minutes left in their workday,
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when suddenly, someone on the 8th floor shouted, "Fire!"
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The fire spread quickly, leaping from one discarded pile of fabric to another.
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Within seconds, the flames engulfed the floor. Workers scrambled to the exit doors, only to find them locked.
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Owners frequently locked exit doors to keep workers in, and union organizers out.
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Less than 20 workers were able to escape down the fire escape before it collapsed, killing several girls.
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Others jammed into service elevators, but they soon stopped running.
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A shipping clerk tried to fight back the flames, but the fire hose had no pressure.
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Many waited by the windows for the fire department, only to find that the firefighters' ladders were 4 stories too short,
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and the water hoses would not reach the flames. They were trapped, unable to escape from the inferno.
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Many chose to jump to their deaths, rather than burn alive.
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William G. Shepherd, March 25th, 1911: "I learned a new sound, a more horrible sound than description can picture.
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It was the thud of a speeding, living body on the stone sidewalk.
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Thud, dead. Thud, dead. Thud, dead. Thud, dead."
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Narrator: In all, 62 girls would leap to their deaths.
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The fire lasted no longer than 30 minutes, leaving 146 dead.
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Rose Cohen, 1911: "I couldn't stop crying for hours, for days.
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Afterwards I used to dream I was falling from my window, screaming.
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I remember I would holler to my mother in the dark, waking everyone up, "Mama, I just jumped out of the window."
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Then I would start crying and I couldn't stop."
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Narrator: After the fire, the owners were put on trial,
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but were not charged with any crime because no law was broken.
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In a civil suit in 1913, the owner settled, paying $75 per deceased victim.
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The fire resulted in a number of new laws for comprehensive safety and worker compensation laws.
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Francis Perkins, the future Secretary of Labor in the Roosevelt administration, had witnessed the fire from the street below.
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[End credit music: "Dust in the Wind" (Kansas)]
