This Week in People’s History, Mar 25–31, 2026
Never Forget the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire!
MARCH 25 IS THE 115TH ANNIVERSARY of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire, which killed 146 garment workers, 123 of whom were women or teenage girls. It was one of the worst industrial disasters ever in New York State, certainly the worst such disaster that was over in less than a day. (Long-term disasters in New York State workplaces, such as those caused by exposure to asbestos and PCBs, have had many more victims, but over the course of years, not minutes.)
The Triangle Shirtwaist fire victims were killed by a fast-moving fire in a crowded high-rise factory where most of the fire exits were locked, forcing the victims to choose between being incinerated or jumping to certain death from windows 200 feet above the street.
The deadly 1911 fire in Greenwich Village had both immediate and long-lasting effects. It gave nascent labor unions the opportunity to organize an extraordinary demonstration, a solemn 3-mile-long memorial parade through the middle of Manhattan by more than 120,000 workers and their supporters.
More than 400,000 people lined the parade route, meaning that more than ten percent of the city’s population was actively involved. Even though it took place on a workday, many workplaces were left nearly empty, turning the memorial event into an unprecedented general strike.
Garment workers' unions saw a major membership surge, and the rage and revulsion at working conditions that caused such carnage gave the state legislature the courage to appoint a Factory Investigating Commission, which held hearings all around the state and drafted more than 40 bills to improve working conditions, almost all of which became law.
March 25 is marked with a solemn annual ceremony by workers’ organizations, occupational safety and health advocates, and the New York City Fire Department, which fills the street outside the building where so many were killed. This year’s commemoration will begin at 11:30am at Washington Place and Greene Street. https://portside.org/2025-03-27/triangle-shirtwaist-factory-fire-commemoration-march-25-1911
Vietnam War Opposed Worldwide
MARCH 26 IS THE 60TH ANNIVERSARY of the second day of protest demonstrations that took place in 30 countries, orchestrated internationally by the 8-month-old National Coordinating Committee to End the War in Vietnam. It was the largest concerted world-wide action for peace that had ever taken place.
In the largest of the 1966 actions, which took place in New York City, more than 50,000 marched down Fifth Avenue to a 3-hour rally in Central Park. Demonstrations took place in at least 100 U.S. cities. In Los Angeles 8,000 joined a teach-in; 6,500 marched in San Francisco; 5,000 in Chicago; 2,000 in Detroit; 1,200 picketed the White House. Ten thousand marched in Paris and there were more than 70 smaller actions in France. 20,000 joined a rally in Rome. Large demonstrations also took place in Toronto and Ottawa, as well as in London, Stockholm, Oslo, Beijing and Tokyo.
The New York City demonstration, which was the largest of its kind in the city ever, was organized by a committee that included representatives of widely differing political tendencies, so disparate that the weekly Guardian newspaper remarked that some were “usually so antipathetic to the others that they conceivably might object to being in the same subway car with them, much less the same room.” Among others, the committee included War Resisters League, Women Strike for Peace, Students for a Democratic Society, Communist Party U.S.A., Socialist Workers Party, Catholic Worker, Young Socialist Alliance, District 65 of the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Workers Union, Youth Against War and Fascism and Workers’ World. https://cdn.wisconsinhistory.org/turning-points/1048.pdf
Andrew Johnson Puts His Racism on Display
MARCH 27 IS THE 160TH ANNIVERSARY of President Andrew Johnson’s decision to veto the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which had passed the Senate by 33 votes to 12 and the House by 111-38. It had passed both houses by such large majorities that Congress was amazed Johnson had decided to veto it, despite the near certainty his veto would be overridden, which it was.
Johnson’s written veto message displayed a blatant racism that surprised many. He rejected the idea of “equality of the white and colored races.” He insisted that the formerly enslaved were less deserving of citizenship than immigrants because “the avenues to freedom and intelligence have just now been suddenly opened” to the former, when an immigrant has “familiarized himself with the principles of a Government.” He invoked the threat of racial intermarriage as the logical consequence of the bill.
When Congress overrode the veto, it was the first time ever that Congress ever enacted a major piece of legislation without the President’s signature. https://emergingcivilwar.com/2023/10/28/echoes-of-reconstruction-veto-of-civil-rights-act-1866/
Lieutenant Calley Gets His Wrist Slapped (1971)
MARCH 29 IS THE 55TH ANNIVERSARY of the 1971 conviction of Lieut. William Calley on 22 counts of premeditated murder of Vietnamese civilians. The killings took place in Sơn Mỹ, a village about 75 miles south of Da Nang. Most people in the U.S. call the village Mỹ Lai.
In 1968 Calley and the 30 U.S. Army troops under his command killed at least 347 (and possibly more than 500) unarmed, unthreatening civilians, including many women and children.
The Sơn Mỹ massacre is largest known massacre of civilians by U.S. ground troops in the 20th century.
The massacre remained a secret for more than two years, but when news of it leaked out, the Army charged Calley and 25 others of having committed crimes. Calley, who was the only one convicted, could have been sentenced to life in prison, but he served only 42 months under house arrest. https://portside.org/2015-03-25/scene-crime
Centuries of Caring for the Poor and the Sick (1736)
MARCH 31 IS THE 290TH ANNIVERSARY of the founding of the first public hospital in what later became the United States when, in 1736, the Common Council of New York City established a 6-bed infirmary on the second floor of the city’s Public Work House, located on what was then the City Common, now City Hall Park.
In 1798 the infirmary moved to the city-owned Belle Vue Farm on the East River, where it acquired the name Bellevue Hospital. It remains at the same location more than 225 years later. https://archive.org/details/anaccountbellev00carlgoog/page/n10/mode/2up
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