Pittsburgh City Council

Residents petition for a hearing to replace a missing workplace safety marker in Market Square.

Written by Amy Whipple

Though the Downtown steel mills are long gone, some residents think that a remembrance of the people who died in them should not be.

Council received a request for a public hearing regarding the “Workplace Accidents and the Law” historical marker in Market Square during its Oct. 13 general meeting.

Twenty-six residents signed the petition for council to hold a public hearing to replace the marker, which has been marked as missing in The Historical Marker Database since September 2025.

Renovations to Market Square began in April of that year and concluded in April 2026.

In 2008, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission dedicated the marker. It commemorated the work of Crystal Eastman during the Pittsburgh Survey, a sweeping social study of the city undertaken from 1907 to 1908. 

Eastman’s contribution, “Work Accidents and the Law” (published in 1910), documented, among other things, 526 workplace deaths and thousands of known injuries in one year. Her 460 pages of findings led to industrial accident prevention programs and workers’ compensation laws, according to the historic marker’s text. 

Council is required by city code to hold the hearing, though it is not yet scheduled. A hearing does not guarantee that the marker will be replaced.

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