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Despair. Panic. Helplessness. These are the jumbled thought of the women working in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory the day of that wretched fire. A fire broke out on the eighth floor of the factory and things went downhill from there. The women on the eighth and tenth floors were able to escape the blaze. However, the women on the ninth floor were not so lucky. Some of them were desperate enough to try and jump to their death. One reporter on the street described the awful site as "A new sound‑‑a more horrible sound than description can picture. It was the thud of a speeding, living body on a stone sidewalk." None of the jumpers lived, over 100 others died on the ninth floor that day. In total the fire would claim 146 lives. Lives of women in their prime. Something had to be done. The fire had many long-lasting effects such as, the creation of the Factory Investigating Committee (FIC), Unionization among garment workers, and a new light being shed upon the poor working conditions.

The Factory Investigating Committee would change the way America operated for the better. They duty of the committee was to go into different factories and inspect the working conditions. The main concern when the committee was sanctioned was fire safety and health care programs. Although, later in the committee's history they would focus more on less substantial topics. The committee emerged from a meeting of religious leaders, teachers, and reformers that came togehter after the memorial service for the women who died in the shirtwaist fire. At first they were rejected but after there was a fire in the state house the legislators began to listen to their ideas. Robert Wagner and Alfred Smith passed a bill on June 30, 1911 that officially created the FIC. In the beginning, the committee was limited to the nine biggest cities in New York, but soon the restriction was lifted and they were aloud to inspect factories across the country. Frances Perkins was put in charge of overseeing the committee and later became the Secretary of Labor for the United States. The committee faced hardships when Governor Sulzer, a strong supporter of the committee, was impeached in 1913 and people began to doubt the relevancy of such a committee. However, as soon as people saw the harsh working conditions they began to support the committee once again.

The working conditions in the "sweatshops" of New York were terrible. The employees were harshly overworked and underpaid. They were packed into tight working spaces which created a hazardous work environment. All doors except for one would be locked in the shop at all times, preventing quick escapes if they were ever necessary. The fire escapes were non-satisfactory, they either didn't work at all, or would work for a few seconds and then break. Fire extinguishing techniques were nothing but failures, water pumps didn't work and there was no back up plan. All of these things added up and proved to play a big role in workplace mishaps. If a few of these simple concepts would have been corrected, those 146 lives would not have to be lost that day. But it took such a disaster to open people's eyes and cause them to react.

Workers were not happy about the working conditions that they were forced to endure. The typical attitude in a sweatshop was "If you don't work hard today, look hard for work tomorrow." Up until this point there was nothing they could do about it, they garment workers had it especially hard. In 1909 a big change was made to the way things would work in the garment factories forever. The International Ladies' Garment Woker's Union (ILGWU) was organized. Female garment workers all over the state of New York banded together to combat the harsh working conditions. The very first protest they organized was called "The Great Revolt." In this single strike the garment industy brought 60,000 workers together to demonstrate against the conditions. Protestors in this demonstration, especially women and children, were abused. They were beaten, threatened at gunpoint, and insulted. However, the Union stands strong and wins the battle for hour restrictions and wage increases. Strikes like this continued to carry on until, in 1938, President Roosevelt passed the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) which enstated a minimum wage, time restriction, and overtime pay requirement.

In conclusion, the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire started a massive revolution in the Manufacturing Industry. For instance it created the Factory Investigation Committee, it created Unions, and it showed people just how bad the working conditions were. Although it may have been a terrible tragedy, it also carried along with it a lot of good. It would forever change the way Americans functioned.

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