Postings from the Island of Staten

So far, Staten Island trolley tours are filling up
by Staten Island Advance Thursday July 10, 2008, 12:38 PM

Hilton Flores/Staten Island Advance
Tourists and Staten Islanders alike took time yesterday to take the 55-minute tour of the borough, which is free this week.

On a day when the haze turned Manhattan's famous skyline into so many ghostly, jagged silhouettes -- obviating the reason so many tourists hop the ferry to Staten Island before making their typical, quickie U-turn -- a red trolley idling in the downstairs parking lot yesterday beckoned the uninitiated to venture deeper into New York City's best-kept secret.

WaFoo will be performing at the Tottenville Branch Library, 7430 Amboy Road, Staten Island, NY 10307, phone number 718-984-0945 this coming Saturday, July 12 at 2:30PM.

WaFoo, literally meaning "wind of Japan" or simply "Japanese style," is a group of talented musicians who have performed in many different countries across the world. WaFoo blends Japanese philosophy into a variety of music styles to create a lyrical, aesthetic and delightful sound to help regain energy for body and soul.

"WaFoo's amalgam of jazz and traditional elements is very, very easy to love."--Michael Fressola, Arts Editor for the Staten Island Advance.

WaFoo will also be performing at other Staten Island branches during the summer months. For more info you can check www.WaFoo.info

Even though I have read about this flag, I don’t recall ever seeing this being flown anyplace on Staten Island. I think some people think the big hill in the background is the garbage dump. And seagulls? Not the most beautiful or noble bird in the world! Somewhat of a scavenger, I believe. Maybe it is just as well it isn’t flown anyplace!

Our cast takes a bow at Staten Island OutLOUD’s annual performance of “Moby Dick” at historic Fort Wadsworth.

What is Staten Island OutLOUD?
Staten Island OutLOUD is a grass-roots dialogue and performance project. Several times a month, we present free gatherings in community settings throughout Staten Island. We gather to read aloud to one another from a variety of world classics and other compelling literature. There’s nothing to buy, nothing to prepare. Just come with an open mind; we’ll lend you copies of the featured literature. Anyone who wants to read aloud is welcome to do so; those who’d prefer not to, can just sit back and enjoy being read to. We draw a diverse, intergenerational audience. In fact, we bring together many people who might otherwise never have a chance to meet. We share ideas about what we’re just read, and enjoy hearing a variety of viewpoints. Most of our events are intimate, participatory readings, but several times a year we present large staged events with music. All our events are free.

So I’ve been a card-carrying (Metropolitan Opera Guild card) opera fan for about 15 years. I’ve probably spent way too much time and money on this interest, but it has been worth it. Opera is a fabulous art form–singing, music, drama, and sometimes dance, all rolled into one (although anti-opera-ists say those things are all done poorly. Somethimes that’s true, but when all elements are working, nothing beats it, in my opinion)

Yesterday…

…and today!

OK, so this is the thing about which just about all Staten Islanders, no matter what their background or politics, have over the years been least proud. The Fresh Kills Landfill (or as we used to call it, “the dump,”) closed on March 22, 2001, certainly in part as a reward from then mayor Rudy Giuliani to Staten Island for its political support.

The dump opened up in 1948 and was supposed to be temporary. It grew to be by most accounts the largest garbage dump in the world.

I had the pleasure(?!) of growing up about two blocks away from one section of the dump. I can remember before it was there. It was a salt marsh that today we would call wetlands. There was a guy whose nickname was “Yonk” and his family owned horses and a barn, and he used to ride a wagon pulled by horses (I swear this is true!) and harvested the hay to feed his horses. This was in the late 1950s or early 1960s. When they started filling in the area with garbage, some were glad because they felt it would kill the horrible infestations of mosquitos we used to get during the summer. However, the mosquitos didn’t go away, and we had the horrible stench to go along with the skeeters. It was good for weather forcasting, though, as right before it rained it REALLY stunk!

Once they covered the garbage with a dirt layer, however, it became somewhat of an unofficial recreation area. Shallow pools of water quickly froze in the winter and we went ice skating there. Some guys went hunting, sometimes getting pheasants but more likely killing rats and sea gulls. Some went fishing, and some went swimming in the Fresh Kills creek. There was a dock with boats there that pre-dated the dump.

I never ate any fish or animals from the dump, (or went swimming there) but I did eat some vegetables that grew up there. They were pretty good (great fertilizer, I guess) but heaven only knows what kind of chemicals were in them. Well, no apparent effects up to this point!

Today, the West Shore Expressway (Route 440) cuts right through the dump. (It wasnt’t there when I was a kid.) It is amazing how quickly nature took over after the dump closed, along with some human help, to make it look like it does in the second picture above. It is actually quite pretty now. Really! The whole thing is going to be turned into parks. Hope it isn’t the usual city project and takes years and years. I’d like to go up there again before I throw off this mortal coil!

Spring has sprung, and for many of us that means the beginning of the baseball season. A few years ago, a ballpark, named Richmond County Ballpark at St. George, was built right next to the Staten Island Ferry terminal. It is the home of the Staten Island Yankees, a Class A minor league team of the New York Yankees. They play a short season (this year from June 17 to September 6). Prices for tickets are cheap; in past years they have been in the $10 range for the best seats. Food prices are cheaper than the major leagues, but not as inexpensive as one might hope, at least in my opinion. Most of the players are right out of high school or college, and for most this is their first professional baseball experience. They play with a lot of enthusiasm and hope.

Current NY Yankees Chien-Ming Wang, Melky Cabrera, and Shelly Duncan all played here before moving on in their baseball careers.

It is a great place to take in a game on a hot summer night, getting a nice breeze from the water. A lot of people rave about the view of the Manhattan skyline, but I think my favorite non-baseball thing is watching all the the ships passing by. It reminds me that we live on an island, which in the day-to-day running around many of us tend to forget. At least I do.

Check it out this summer if you get a chance! Even if you aren't a big baseball fan, I think you will still enjoy it!

The St. George Library branch is right up the street and is open till 8:00PM Monday thru Thursday.

This bridge changed everything on Staten Island, changing it from a rural area of small towns and open spaces and farms (which I recall) to one of suburbia. I remember going to Fort Wadsworth with my family in the early 1960s to check the progress of the building of the bridge. The fort is now open to the public, and it is managed by the National Park Service and is part of the Gateway National Recreation Area.

Staten Island was a Tory area during the American Revolution. However, I read an account that said Americans were standing in the area of the picture above when British ships left New York after losing the revolution. Apparently the British fired a shot at the new citizens of America as they were yellling insults at the departing soldiers and sailors of their former country.

Two books about the bridge that are available for borrowing are The Bridge by Gay Talese and Spanning the Narrows by Brian Merlis.

The South Beach branch is close by this scene.

Caption-After School at Kreischerville: children lined up at librarian’s table behind bookwagon.
No date given.

Kreischerville is the next town north of Tottenville, but today it is called Charleston. Kreischerville was named after the owner of a brickyard, an industry that once thrived here as the clay-type soil here was good for making bricks. Some of the excavations were filled in by water and today are called Clay Pit Ponds. Mr. Kreischer’s mansion is still here. It was converted into a restaurant a few years ago, but it is now closed. I believe the brickyards were closed in the 1920s or 1930s.

Picture from NYPL Digital Gallery

This is an an email I received from the President fo the Tottenville Historical Society:

“I received a note today from long-time Tottenville resident Gordon Ekstrand, who is also Past Post Commander of the local American Legion, Beauvais-Hudson Post No. 126. He writes:

“I have been working since November 2006 to have the Borough Commissioner of Parks Thomas Paulo erect a new sign at the Pavilion next to Conference House Park . I called his office and was told the sign is up. I walked down to the pavilion and it’s really up above the steps. Also Sen. Lanza’s office pushed them, too. The brass $300.00 plaque reads: Dedicated to Almer G. Russell

Machine Gun Battalion 321

World War I

Born 1891 ~ Died 1918

Our Beauvais-Hudson Post No. 126 on Memorial Day and Veterans Day visits 7 locations to have a service, and the pavilion is one of the stops we make and place a wreath in the water for sailors lost at sea.”

FYI: The Pavilion was constructed in the 1930s to honor local resident Almer Russell who was killed in action in France . The neglected structure had become unsafe and was razed in 1963. Many individuals and organizations petitioned the city for 30+ years to rebuild it. Finally, in 2002, the Pavilion was reopened, but with virtually no mention of Almer Russell.

So, if you are in the area, take a walk to the Pavilion in Conference House Park and see the new brass plaque mounted in memory of a fallen soldier. And say “thank you” to Almer, and also to Gordon and his Legion comrades for their work and especially for their service. We should never forget.”

When I was a boy my family occasionally drove here all the way from Travis, Staten Island to take in the cool breezes coming off of Raritan Bay. I was very happy when they re-built it. It is in the Conference House Park, which is about a mile from the Tottenville Branch.

The Tottenville Book Discussion group met this past Monday night to discuss The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson. We had a pretty good discussion, but I think I liked the book a whole lot more than most of the group. They liked it, but they didn’t think it was fabulous like I did. It was one of the best books I have read in a long time, and I loved how he interwove the story of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair and of the serial killer, H.H. Holmes. (This is a nonfiction book that read like a really good novel.)
One participant said she just wanted to read about the serial killer and didn’t much care for the World’s Fair part. Another said she couldn’t really feel sympathy for any of the characters. Someone else said they thought people in the story were naive, to which I asked, “Were they naive, or was it just that it was a different time and place from our own?” I had a hard time drawing from them why the author chose to put these two stories side by side. The group is usually pretty good, but they gave some really strange answers to this question. (”Maybe he wanted a gimmick to help sell his book.” “If he just wrote about the World’s Fair no one would want to read it.”) To me, it was symbolic of a passing simpler time to the more complicated, and violent, 20th century. Trying to be a good book discussion leader, I never said that to the group but tried to draw it out of them. Some of them sort of got it.
I didn’t realize until I looked up on the Internet that the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago stands on the site of the Palace of Fine Arts from the Fair. While it was totally rebuilt to be a permanent structure, it has the exact same design. When I was in the Navy and stationed near Chicago, I visited the Museum, so I had some sense of where the World’s Fair was located.
A great book, and easy to read! It’s a coming of age story for our country. It is both entertaining and thought-provoking. I highly recommend it!!!
For more info on the book go to:
http://www.amazon.com/Devil-White-City-Madness-Changed/dp/0375725601/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1202848122&sr=8-1

OK, so I admit the link of  this picture to the Tottenville Branch is tenuous–it is geographically far from Tottenville, but this is where the Tottenville Branch librarian (me) was born! Sadly, the building is unoccupied and in a very dilapidated state. After Staten Island Hospital moved to its new location (sometime in the late 1970s or early 1980s) this building was converted into an apartment building, but it went bankrupt after a few years. Some squatters occupied  part of it a few years ago, but they were evicted. I think there are legal issues that keep it from being developed. It is a real eyesore in the neighborhood, which is very close to where I presently live.
(Picture from NYPL Digital Gallery)

Many people think the name of this bridge is the Outer Bridge, because it is on the outer reaches of Staten Island and NYC.  However, it was named after Eugenius Harvey Outerbridge who was the first chairman of the Port Authority of New York and was a Staten Island resident. (I guess the Outerbridge Bridge would sound too odd.)
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outerbridge_Crossing
The Staten Island side of the bridge is actually in Richmond Valley, the next town to Tottenville, and links the island to Perth Amboy, New Jersey continuing Route 440 which also goes through Staten Island. The bridge opened on June 29, 1928.
Mr. Outerbridge’s sister, Mary, is credited with importing the game of tennis to the United States, with the first game being played at the Staten Island Cricket Club
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Ewing_Outerbridge

From NYPL Digital Gallery-No date given.

Perth Amboy Tottenville Ferry Slip
The site of ferry service to Staten Island dates to 1684 when the likes of Ben Franklin and the Lenape Indians used its service to traverse the Arthur Kill. The service closed in 1963. The ferry slip was restored in 1998 to its 1904 appearance. A replica of the ticket office has been constructed and used as a small museum.
I’ve never been to Perth Amboy. People tell me it is a nice town. Got to get there one of these days, but I almost always get lost when I drive in New Jersey!

The Tottenville Ferry ran between Tottenville and Perth Amboy, New Jersey. Tottenville residents used to shop in Perth Amboy, using the ferry. The ferry went out of service sometime in the 1960s. I have a distinct memory form the early 1960s of my father bringing the family car to a mechanic in Tottenville, and the two of us riding the ferry to Perth Amboy and back again. I don’t know why I remember it; maybe it was just nice spending some “quality” time with just me and my Dad.  

This is the Stadium Theater on Main Street in Tottenville. The caption on the photo says 1927 to 1951. El Paso and Alias Nick Beal, the movies on the marquee were released in 1949.  The building, I believe, is now empty, but it was recently a wharehouse for furniture, I think. (The marquee is still there.) In 1968-69 it was one of the hot spots on Staten Island, as it was turned into a discotheque, complete with strobe lights. I remember a cover band doing the full-length version of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida by Iron Butterfly. It was really groovy!
For other pictures of old Staten Island movie theaters, go to: http://oldstatenisland.tripod.com/theaters.htm

The Tottenville Branch–From NYPL Digital Gallery-No date given.
The branch was renovated in 1993 and has new shelving, but the pattern of the shelving is the same. The chandeliers were gone the first time I clustered at Tottenville in the mid-1980s, replaced by ugly fluorescent lighting. Chandeliers were designed for the renovation. The designers worked from old photos. The circ desk has the same horseshoe shape, but it is in a different position. The front door is to the left of the picture.

The Conference House, (also known as the Bentley Manor and the Captain Christopher Billop House) was built before 1680 and located near the southern most tip of New York State in Staten Island. It is famous for the Peace Conference held there on September 11, 1776, which unsuccessfully attempted to end the American Revolutionary War. The House, a National and New York City Landmark, is the only pre-Revolutionary manor house still surviving in New York City. It stands majestically in Conference House Park overlooking Raritan Bay.
From Wikipedia–
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conference_House

Tottenville, area approx. 1.7 square miles (4.4 km²), is the southernmost neighborhood of Staten Island, New York City and New York State. Originally named Bentley Manor by one of its first settlers, Captain Christopher Billop (1638-1726), after the ship on which he sailed to America in 1667, the district was renamed Tottenville in 1869, apparently in honor of Gilbert Totten, a local American Revolutionary War hero. (From Wikipedia)
I drive by this sign everyday on my way to work at the branch!