The day was March 25, 1911. It was a normal day for the Triangle Waist Company and its 500 workers. They sewed their shirtwaists on their 12 hour long work shifts for their $15 paycheck at the end of the week.

The factory was on the 8th, 9th, and 10th floors of the Asch Building located in New York City. The majority of the workers were immigrant women around the ages 16-23. At this time in America women had very little to no rights to anything, and working in factories was as dangerous as ever.

In 1909 a strike was held by the Ladies Garment Workers Union against New York clothing factories. They demanded higher pay, shorter hours, and safer work environments. They got several smaller factories to agree with the demands.

However, Issac Harris and Max Blanck not only denyed them this, the joined a group of manufactiors who fought them using dirty tactics such as paying police to beat the striking workers. Eventually they agreed to their terms but denied the opportunity to become a union. Even after this the work was still unsafe, very tiring, and not safe.

After the strikes a worker named Isidore Abramowitz was about to go back to his home on March 25, 1911 at around 4:40 pm. He worked on the 4th floor cutting fabric. He saw sparks in a bin that they used for discarded scraps of fabric.

He quickly grabbed several buckets of water that was placed in many spots around the factory in case of a fire and dumped one on the flames. How ever with all the wooden tables and chairs in the room, the fire quickly became out of control 

There was many fairways and elevators around the bulling however in the northeast corner, where the fire was, the doors to the stairs were locked. Thankfully one person had the keys and most people on the 8th floor was able to get out. The workers on the 10th floor made it to the roof where they were rescued.

With that being said 146 workers died in fire. This was because the elevators were moved by workers and the got as many people as they could but many threw themselves down the elevator shaft to get out. The fire escape ladder was too weak for the weight of the people so many fell to the ground. And there were some who simply never made it out of the fire.