Friday, March 25, 2011

What is a Shirtwaist?

Shirtwaist - What the Heck is That?


I have wondered since I first read the story of the

Triangle Shirt Factory

I have often wondered what a shirtwaist is and now that I have the internet, I know.

Shirtwaist—A woman’s top detached from the skirt. At first the focal point was the shoulders then it moved to the front.
Images—Here are some shirtwaist Images:






Hop On Press Works

Triangle Shirtwaist Fire

Triangle Shirtwaist Fire

Every Ten Years or so this story pops up. I like it.

At 3:40 p.m. Friday, Chicago time, it will be exactly 100 years to the minute since someone tossed a cigarette into a bin of scrap cloth on the 8th floor of the Asch Building on New York’s Lower East Side, touching off what for the last century has been known as the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire.

It was a Saturday, so only 600 of the usual 1,000 employees — 500 women and girls and 100 men — were working. Their 12-hour shift over, they had put their street clothes on, collected their pay envelopes — $6 a week — and were waiting for the bell. Ten minutes later the place would have been empty.

There is more news all over the web.