The 1911 Triangle fire killed 141 workers trapped by locked exits

Evidence

Someone in the tenth-floor work-room lit a cigarette and tossed the match away. It hadn’t burned out when it fell into the ankle-deep litter around the sewing machines. … There was a puff of smoke, and then a sheet of flame. The exits were inadequate, the doors to many locked. As the terrified girls jammed against them in panic, scores were crushed to death. Others were suffocated by the heavy smoke. As it billowed around them and the flames crept closer, girls leaped from the windows. Bodies smashed against the sidewalks and tore through sidewalk gratings. The death toll was 141. — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker, 538

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: The locked-exit detail and the fire’s catalyzing role parallel themes in ‘On Sacrifice’ about institutional neglect of the vulnerable and the moral weight placed on deaths that could have been prevented.