Mrs. Freedman went to work in the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory in Manhattan at age 18, after coming to the U.S. from Austria a few years earlier. She was among more than 500 survivors of the fire that swept the eighth, ninth, and 10th floors of the building on March 25, 1911. Most of the victims were women and girls. The fire remains the worst industrial tragedy in New York City history.
Last survivor of historic fire dies
Rose Freedman, 107, the last survivor of a fire that killed 146 New York City garment workers in 1911 and spawned industrial safety reforms that reverberate to this day, died in mid-February at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif.