On March 25th, 1911, a fire broke out in a scrap bin at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City’s Greenwich Village neighborhood. One of the deadliest industrial disasters in U.S. history took the lives of 146 garment workers, most of them recent Jewish and Italian immigrant women and girls aged 14-23. The highly publicized tragedy galvanized the nascent labor movement in the United States, particularly the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (ILGWU), and resulted in legislation requiring workplace safety standards that many of us take for granted today.
This year, TATTER will mark the anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire with a collectively embroidered banner honoring each of the 146 victims. We began with Lizzie, first alphabetically on the list. Originally from Romania, she had been in the country only three months at the time of the tragedy. We embellished her name with traditional Romanian embroidery motifs to honor her memory. In the midst of alarming cuts to government agencies tasked with enforcing regulations and protections for vulnerable Americans, it seems more important than ever that we both remember our hard fought gains and continue to press and march for social and economic justice.
We invite you to raise your needles and join us in assembling this memorial banner, which will be stitched together by TATTER and unfurled at the Triangle Fire Memorial on March 25th, 2025. Each registrant will be sent a name to embroider with guidelines for fabrication. TATTER will need to be in receipt of submissions by March 18th. Participants are welcome to join a virtual stitch-in on March 4th for an evening of communal embroidery and conversation.
To learn more about the moving Triangle Fire Memorial dedicated in 2023, please visit Remember the Triangle Fire Coalition for opportunities to learn, participate, and give.
- Sign up to take a name
- Fabrication guidelines to be sent out Wednesday, February 26th
- Stitch and send by March 18th
- Optional virtual stitch-in on March 4th
- TATTER will sew the names together and unroll the banner at Triangle Fire Memorial on March 25th, 2025