Category: Civil Rights

  • The Sparks of the Triangle Fire – Before and After

    Sparks of the Triangle Fire   On April 5, 1911, nearly a half-million people witnessed or marched in a symbolic funeral procession commemorating the victims of the Triangle Waist Company Fire. Organized by the International Ladies Garment Worker Union, (ILGWU), the cortege included a horse-drawn, empty hearse and an estimated 120 thousand protesters demanding improvements for…

  • The Triangle Fire

    The Triangle Fire

    The Triangle Fire: A prologue                       Though a coincidence, the Triangle Fire of 1911 is memorialized each March, designated as Women’s History Month. While on each anniversary of the March 25 inferno that claimed 146 lives we remember those who died as innocent victims –…

  • Dodging the Bullet – Newtown and Gun Violence

    A Code Blue Day By coincidence my day in the classroom began with a scheduled Code Blue drill. During my school years our disaster preparation was limited to fire and tornado drills. The ridiculous duck and cover from nuclear blast drills had, by then, been discontinued. The relatively new exercises developed in response to the…

  • Media’s memory tested as Supreme Court revisits Voting Rights Act

    “Don’t worry about it.” Those familiar with the early morning events of December 7, 1941, are familiar with this regrettable phrase. When Lieutenant Kermit Tyler dismissed an inexperienced radar operator’s vague report of unidentified aircraft approaching Hawaii on that morning, the response was not unreasonable. However, the failure to consider the overall possibilities of that…