Industrialization 1911

Don’t click on this symbol in the corner

Click on this symbol

Industrial Revolution

• The switch from home made to factory made products.

Home made clothes Factory made clothes

Gibson Girl and the shirtwaist

• Shirtwaists were a style of blouse (a women’s shirt)

• They were VERY popular in the late 19th early 20th century. American’s bought $1.3 billion in clothes in 1909 ($23 billion 2012)

The clean proper “Gibson Girl” look was “IN” “Gibson Girls” wore shirtwaists

Small sweat shops• Anyone could

get a contract with a company to make clothes for them.

• Then make tiny “factory” inside the owners apartment.

• Then get new immigrants (greenhorns) who need work to do the sewing

Typical sweat shop, the owner and his family also lived here

Bigger factories

• Bigger factories are more efficient and can produce many more products then smaller factories.

• This makes the cost of the product go down…allows the entrepreneur more profits

• Max Blanck and Isaac Harris start off as “greenhorns” working in tiny sweatshops, then start their own company that grows into the Triangle Shirtwaist Company.

Triangle Owners

• Both of the “Triangle” companies owners were Jewish immigrants from Russia to the US.

• Both had worked their way up from workers in tiny East Side sweatshops to rich factory owners.

• Max Blanck a Russian Jew starts as a garment contractor at the age of 25, handles the money.

• Isaac Harris, also a Russian Jew is older and a skilled tailor, knew the clothing business.

• Start the Triangle Shirt Waist Company in 1900. In 1902 they move into the Asch building, 29 Washington Place,on the 8, 9 and 10th floor a new 10 story “loft” building.

Asch BuildingGo to Google Earth and type in: “Washington Place and Greene St. New York City”.

The old Asch Building has the blue covered walkway around the base. Answer the following questions about how the building looks today.

How many stories tall the building?

Go down Greene St., what letters are on the purple flag?

The Asch Building still stands at the corner of Washington Place and Greene St. It has been renamed.

Cheap labor

• Immigrants (people who just moved to the US) were desperate for work and would take any job for whatever money they could get. Averaged $5 for 100 hour work week.

• Thousands of new immigrants (called Greenhorns because they didn’t know anything) arrived in New York City every week so there were more workers then jobs.

Click HereFor a movie Mr. Deserto took of how Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty look today.

Child Labor

• Early in American history and in Europe, there were no laws against child labor. Children were EXPECTED to work.

• Poor American and immigrant families only survived by sending their children to work.

• Bosses like hiring kids because they could pay them much less money = more profit for the boss.

Young hotel workers

Triangle Shirt Waist Company• High volume from many workers =

increased profits for Max Blanck and Isaac Harris the owners.

• The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory was the largest shirtwaist maker in the USA.

Click HereFor a movie about what it was like inside the Triangle Factory.

Methods to make

Triangle the best

• Large numbers of workers close together to easily watch over.

• Many machines closely packed• Scraps kept under tables• Few exits for workers to sneak out from

Triangle workers

• Triangle owners Blanck and Harris employed young immigrant girls because they worked for small wages and the neighborhood was full of them.

• Most were single Jewish girls from Poland and Russia. The rest were poor girls from Italy.

How was the Triangle Factory an example of Industrialization?

Photo of the building that housed the Triangle Shirtwaist Company. Taken by Mr. Deserto 2009