IAP 180: Memorializing the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire with Special Guests Mary Anne Trasciatti and Edvige Giunta

The Italian American Podcast

One hundred and ten years ago, on March 25, 1911, a conflagration engulfed the top three stories of a nondescript building in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire caused the deaths of 146 garment workers, most of whom were recent Italian and Jewish immigrant women and girls. The aftermath of this event changed American labor relations and influenced the burgeoning feminist movement, yet this tragedy often goes unmentioned in the telling of American history.

In this week’s episode, we meet with Edvige Giunta and Mary Anne Trasciatti, two professors who have dedicated their careers to ensuring that Triangle is remembered, and that its impact on our community, our country and the world today will be understood by younger generations.

We’ll share the story of this incomparable tragedy, and discuss how it happened and how the events of that fateful day unfurled. We’ll also explore why the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire is vitally important to the study of Italian American and women’s history.

We will also examine how the fire is remembered today, through personal and community-wide observances, and how the efforts of activists like our guests are culminating in a permanent, interactive memorial to the victims.

Please join us as we remember this tragedy and do our part to ensure it is not forgotten.

Also, please join this year’s virtual memorial observances on March 25 at 6 p.m. by visiting http://rememberthetrianglefire.org/.

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