Triangle Fire Quotes

There really is a close competition between the canned good industry of this state and that of other states, and that while the canners of other states are operating under general exemptions from the labor law provisions, it will produce a harsh, if not destructive, competition to compel the New York canner to attempt to operate under strict regulation as to the hours of employment.

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“Conditions in Canneries”, Memorandum of the New York State Canners’ Association. By John. F. Connor, attorney for the canners’ association. Only date available: 1913.
401201/01/1913 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

They are not over-intelligent…They formed habits of living that they carried with them to their work, and that made it very difficult indeed to correct them.

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Arthur S. Summers, a manufacturer of dry colors.
401903/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

The chief cause [of lead poisoning among color workers] used to be the careless habits of the men, in not properly washing themselves after handling the lead materials, eating their lunches with their hands covered with the stuff…

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Arthur S. Summers, a manufacturer of dry colors.
401803/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

[On why they don’t have medical inspections of their workers] In every case where the men have claimed to have been infected or affected by the lead they were intemperate men…[Meaning:] A man that drank a good deal of beer. …the other men who worked longer at it, who don’t drink, are not affected by it.

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Clarence F. Shipman, foreman at the Splitdorf Magneto Company (lead).
402103/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

The only tendency toward illness comes to men who are intemperate in their habits. In every case of poisoning I have heard of, the man was an exceedingly hard drinker….Where the men are temperate in their habits I never found a case…

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Arthur S. Summers, a manufacturer of dry colors.
402003/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

The rent is very high, and you can’t recent a place above ground in New York city to establish a bakery. If you can’t have a bake shop in a basement in New York City, you can’t have a bake shop here, that is all, unless people will pay prohibitive prices for bread; And we hear a great deal now about the high cost of living.

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Mr. Frank P. Hill, baker.
400103/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

I want to say that a bakery that conducts their business in what you term a cellar can keep it just as clean as though they were in any other part of the building. I believe it entirely depends upon the person who is running the place.

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Leslie A. Ware, baker.
400003/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

You are putting a lot of people out of business and perhaps raising the price of bread….things are getting a little bit better [without “drastic” reforms], slowly, and I am not certain whether or not that would not be a pretty drastic remedy, not against the worst ones, but against the best of that class.

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P. Tecumseh Sherman. Attorney, and previously held the position of Commissioner of the Labor Department of New York. Only date available: 1912.
399301/01/1912 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

This night work has been rendered necessary largely because of the Government’s perfectly unreasonable attitude towards large corporations, which has made it impossible for managers of large concerns to know whether….they could expand their plans to keep up with increasing demands or not.

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George W. Perkins, director of the Harvester Company.
399908/22/1911 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

We have laws that in a crisis we find are no laws and we have enforcement that when the hour of trial comes we find is no enforcement.

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Rabbi Stephen Wise, 1911
415204/01/1911 | Full Details | Law(s): Triangle Factory Laws

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