A Weekly Independent Newspaper Published Every Thursday, Circulating in Canarsie, Seaview, Paedegat, Mill Basin, Georgetown, Bergen Beach, Kings Plaza, Flatlands, Flatbush & Starrett City

The Canarsie Courier serves all of the communities named above, but if you lived in Canarsie you knew it was "our newspaper." Well now you have your old Thursday Pal back. The Canarsie Courier will be allowing us to share a piece of "Our History" as they allow us to list some of the events from the column compiled each week by Neil S.Friedman called, This Week In Canarsie History.

There was a article in March 12th 1998 issue about this Web Site:

Canarsie's On The Internet

     Native Canarsiens consider their community one of the few remaining New York City neighborhoods that has managed to maintain a traditional feeling. Nerertheless, thousands of original Canarsiens who have relocated to warmer climates and cozier suburbs still consider this community "home."

     In keeping with contemporary gadgetry, Canarsie's on the Internet at  http://members.aol.com/basbalking/index.html

The Canarsie Courier is in search of the 1st Issue ever published. If you have that elusive issue please call the Canarsie Courier at (718) 257-0600

July 16th - July 22nd

1960...Fireman First Grade Walter Fourness, who lives in Canarsie, is awarded a medal for heroism for saving an 18-month-old child, in a Manhattan blaze...The New York Transit Authority announcement that shuttle service on the BMT 14th Street line will be discontinued, is welcomed by Canarsie commuters...1964...The 69th Precinct Youth Council names a King and Queen of their "Watermelon Festival," with funds raised going to its various programs...1968...U.S. Army Sgt Louis Fabian Peralez, of East 85th Street, is killed in action in South Vietnam, just nine days after Conklin Avenue resident PFC Gordon Browne is killed after stepping on a land mine...Jennie Galvano of Skidmore Avenue is reuinted after 55 years with her younger sister, Benedetta Grado, who arrives in the U.S. from Monteallegro, Sicily...1972...69th Precinct patrolman Richard Gamble, who is critically wounded by a robber's bullet in February, returns to his Long Island home and family in a wheelchair, after undergoiong five months of physical therapy...Free "Concerts Under the Stars," featuring popular classical music, will be held at Canarsie Beach Park later in the summer...1976...A 21-month-old girl is revived at Brookdale Hospital after she nearly drowns in her Rockaway Parkway family's above ground swimming pool...1980...Now that eighteen year old males can register for Selective Service at U.S. Post Offices, the manager of the Canarsie branch promises he will make it "as easy and painless as possible"...A unlicensed teenager allegedly speeding the wrong way on East 88th Street on a unregistered dirt bike, hits two young sisters, killing the older 9-year-old...1984...A 22-year-old Bronx man fishing off Canarsie Pier is killed when an out-of-control car smashes through a park bench and railing then knocks him into Jamaica Bay...1988...After several hours of talking to a man barricaded inside his own Breukelen Houses apartment, Police Emergency Service Unit personnel force their way in and remove him...1992...Although construction workers, including one who refused medical treatment after he claimed he was attacked with a baseball bat, tell police they were attacked at the East 81st Street site by a group of black men demanding "more contruction jobs for minorities," they refuse to provide officials with anything but sketchy information...1996...Police are searching for suspects in connection with the recent robberies of a shoe store and a fast-food restaurant in the Rockaway Parkway Shopping Center.

1959...A borough superintendent says that Canarsie will definitely get a two-day-a-week alternate -side-of-the-street parking before summer's end...1963...An 18-year-old Canarsie resident saves two friends from drowning after a sudden undertow pulls them under the ocean waters off Rockaway Beach... Macy's and Gimbel's deny persistent rumors that a major department store is scheduled to open in the near future in the area...A Coast Guard helicopter snatches a man entrenched waist-deep in the mud in Paerdegat Basin near Canarsie Beach Park...1967...After picking up a distress call from a South American counterpart, a local ham radio operator contacts state health officials who rush a life-saving drug to Venezuelan doctors in an effort to save a dying girl...Letter carriers and postal clerks picket outside the Canarsie post office protesting wages they claim are not comparable to other federal employees...An alert 69th Precinct patrolman dives into the choppy waters of Jamaica Bay to rescue a drowing 55-year-old woman, who fell off Canarsie Pier...1971...Two newlyweds preparing their backyard, at East 94th Street and Avenue D, for a terrace and garden, unearth a pair of century-old headstones...1975...The Brooklyn Arts and Cultural Association announces its summer lineup of Sunday concerts at Canarsie Pier...The loss of manpower at the Rockaway Parkway firehouse, due to massive citywide layoffs, is reduced as two firefighters, recently laid off,are reinstated...1979...Following a month long strike. the Pioneer Bus Company, which provided an alternate to the subways for thousands of Brooklyn commuters, calls it quits...1983...Canarsie is selected as one of three borough communities scheduled to be wired for cable television...An angry group of residents on East 89th Street near Glenwood Road protest the initial construction of a proposed 21-unit apartment building they say will "adversely affect" the quality of the neighborhood...1987 Workers are nearly finished installing the AstroTurf surface as part of the $2 million renovation of Canarsie High School's athletic field...1991...Six police officers are hurt and three civilians are arrested when angry residents storm the 69th Precinct after a patrol car allegedly raced through their July 4th block party looking for illegal fireworks.

1962...The annual New York City Parks Department report proposes a beach,bathhouse,and a public parking area, if the polluted waters of Jamaica Bay are cleaned...Eleven-year-old Courier deleviery boy Frank Duffy gets a brand, new bicycle in a contest sponsered by the 45-year-old community weekly...1970...The city's Buildings Department amends rulings that will allow homeowners to erect tool sheds in their own backyards...Local residents blockade the intersection of Glenwood Road and East 85th Street to protest a missing "Stop" sign and the "sickening accidents" that have resulted...Observers accuse loitering drug addicts of igniting the second fire in a week in the public restrooms of the I.S. 211 playground...1974...A decision to build homes on the Fresh Creek landfill is supported by a local civic group and construction of three-story, two-family homes is expected to begin any day...Controversy continues over the Paerdegat Racquet Club's boating facility that could lead to the demise of the Sebago Canoe Club...Canarsie High School senior Theresa D'Apolito garners ten awards at graduation exercises and is voted "most likely to succeed"...1978...A trio of 13-year-olds, who are products of the 69th Precinct Community Council baseball program, are selected to compete in the World baseball Games to be held this month in Puerto Rico...1982...Over 200 residents of Starrett City and surrounding communities rally near the Pennsylvania Avenue landfill to protest reports of toxic waste dumping at the site...Plans are announced for the revitalization of the Avenue L shopping district, including a summer street fair that is expected to benefit merchants and consumers...1986...Despite the unhealthy conditions and dangers of Jamaica Bay, bathers ignore warnings as they attempt to get reief from temperatures hovering near 100 degrees and enter the polluted water...The hot weather elicits complaints from residents about "foul smells" coming from the Brooklyn Terminal Market...Police search for leads in the death of a 21-year-old man discovered in the weeds along the Belt Parkway, near Rockaway Parkway, with two gunshot wounds to the head...1990...Police arrest two teenagers suspected in a rash of burglaries along the commercial strip of upper Rockaway parkway...A Canarsie man, arrested by Maine police for the murder of a 22-year-old Coney Island man, is scheduled for a hearing on his refusal to be expedited back to New York to stand trial...1994...The Canarsie Volunteer AmbulancCorps announces it is short of funds, as well as volunteer manpower.

1961...Hundreds of area parents attend a downtown Brooklyn Board of Education meeting to voice their urgent concerns about delays in building schools in Canarsie...A Canarsie Community Council leader suggests using "common sense" when dealing with the revived campaign to ban the wearing of "short shorts" in public...1965...A bizarre police case comcludes when the district attorney's office reveals that a 34- year-old Brooklyn woman and a 15-year-old boy, who were found unconscious on Canarsie Pier, were part of a suicide pact disclosed when the woman awoke at the hospital...The community mourns the untimely death of 58-year-old Dr. Harry Diamond, who had been a popular Canarsie resident for 58 years...Plans for a wholesale meat market in the Brooklyn Terminal Market are near completion...1969...Canarsiens continue to vent their frustrations to the Transit Authority for neglecting "the justifiable demands of commuters," regarding the deteriorating conditions on local subway and bus lines...After 12 years at P.S. 272 kindergarten teacher Ruth Goldstein receives her Masters degree in Early Childhood Education and is nominated for "Teacher of the Year" honors in a national magazine competition...1973...Spring Creek homeowners request a study be conducted to determine the feasibility of having bus service extended to their community...Muscleman Lou Ferrigno, who later portrayed televisions "Incredible Hulk," is the featured guest at a "Mr. New York City" Body Beautiful contest held at Canarsie High School...1977... A 15-year-old mathematics whiz, from East 103rd Street, is one of the youngest ever to graduate from the City University of New York when he receives a bachelor's degree from Brooklyn College...1981 ...Four residents are injured from flying glass and debris when a nearby apartment gas leak causes an explosion that rocks houses in the vicinity of Glenwood Road and East 77th Street...1985...According to a consultant, if merchants along Rockaway Parkway want to attract more shoppers, it needs more"extensive facelift," including improved lighting, trees, and sidewalks...A panal of judges awards the Canarsie Historical Society a blue ribbon and a cash prize for one of the best exhibits at the "Welcome Back to Brooklyn" Festival...1989...Police officers from the Organized Crime Control Bureau raid a Ralph Avenue"chop shop" they say was fronting as an auto salvage yard...1993...Three teenagers playing at Seaveiw Park discover a piece of luggage containing a cache of drugs police estimate as a "street value of $5000"...A freighter carrying over 300 illegal Chinese immigrants runs aground a few miles south of Canarsie near Riis Park. 

1960...City Officials, civic and religious leaders are among the hundreds who attend the groundbreaking ceremony for the Remsen Heights Jewish Center on Avenue K...Four hundred craft participate in the 5th annual blessing of the Fleet at Canarsie Pier...1964...New York City Commissioner Henry Barnes gives final approval for the fall construction of a municipal parking lot on Rockaway Parkway between Glenwood and Farragut roads...1968...Canarsian Cy Lederman, the nation's top blind bowler, and four other blind or partially-sighted local bowlers win the National Blind Bowlers Tournament in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania for the sixth consecutive year...1972...The Canarsie Beach Cultural & Civic Group holds a community street festival atteended by hundreds along Seaview Avenue...1976...A Bicentennial time capsule, to be opened in 100 years, is planted in the garden of Winthrop Junior High School 232...1980...The Canarsie Volunteer Amulance Corps reports that it responded to over 100 emergency calls during May...1984...Alex Lieberman, of East 84th Street, a former top city leasing official, pleads guilty of accepting kickbacks and bribes in the largest extortion case ever prosecuted by the federal government...1988...Following leads from a March murder, 69th Precinct detectives arrest a 26-year-old Queens man and charge him in the shooting death of an East 93rd Street man...If a Department of Consumer Affairs proposal to raise newsstand licenses by more than $900 a year is OK'd, one located near the Rockaway Parkway subway station may close...1992...Local firefighters quell a smoky blaze at the Paerdegat Yacht Club with one badly burned civilian sent to the hospital.

1959...On an appropriately warm, sunny spring day, thousands attend the grand opening of the Seaview Pool and Yacht Club, touted as the largest of its kind in the metropolitan area...1963...A ceremony is held to inaugurate the sound and lighting systems recently installed at Canarsie Athletic Field...The New York City Housing Board rebuffs Paerdegat Basin residents on a plan to erect 2,100 high-rise apartments amidst their private houses...1971...A special parade through the community highlights events surrounding the opening of a local sports field complex, which will be home of the Canarsie Baseball Leagues..Four young drag racing enthusiasts are arrested on various charges, including instigating a melee inside the 69th Precinct stationhouse...1975...An experimental new $20,000 computerized eye-test apparatus is used to check the vision of students at P.S.276...An eleven-year-old, who lives on Ralph Avenue, was a special guest in the nation's capital after winning an essay contest sponsered by a national tabloid...1979...The Canarsie Veterans Monument, at the Rockaway Parkway traffic circle off the Belt Parkway, is dedicated before the local Memorial Day parade begins...1983...Special low interest home improvement loans, at an astonishingly low 7.5%, are approved for Canarsie homeowners who live in "a specific targeted area"...American Legion Post 573 donates an American flag to fly atop the local ambulance corps' headquarters at East 95th Street...1987...Locals cope with an unbearable heat wave by hanging out on Canarsie Pier or under the spray of fire hydrants...1991...Holy Family Church is faced with an $11,000 sidewalk repair bill after a Flatlands Avenue revitalization project declares property owners responsible for improvements...1995...Officials at P.S.272 and parents reject a Board of Education report claiming it had the highest rate of violent incidents among Brooklyn' elementary schools.

1962...Prompted by a letter in the Canarsie Couier, New York City Traffic Commissioner Henry Barnes attends a local Chamber of Commerce meeting to hear requests for a municipal parking lot near Rockaway Parkway BMT subway station...1966...State Senator Simon Liebowitz calls for a study of jet noise frpm aircraft approaching Kennedy Airport because he says its "driving some people in Canarsie crazy"...1970...After an extensive boat tour of Jamaica Bay, local officials and civic leaders call for an extensive cleanup of the waterway after spotting raw sewage, garbage and damage along the shoreline...Canarsie AWARE announces it will hold a "Moratorium on Drugs Day" in June...1974...John Wilson Junior High School students "discover" a 64-year-old artist, formerly of Czechoslovakia, living in Canarsie and adopt her as their "Grandma"...Eighteen area junior high and high school students receive the Brooklyn District Attorney's Citation of Honor" for outstanding leadership, character and service to school and community...The recently reactivated Paerdegat Civic Association campaigns against speeding traffic along Paedergat Avenue North...1982...Joseph Milo, owner of the novelty Shop on Glenwood Road, is shot and killed by unknown assailant with an as yet undetermined motive...P.S.114 celebrates its 75th anniversary with a week of diamond jubilee events...1986...Police are trying to determine the circumstances surrounding an incident whereby a 23-year-old Canarsie man is critically shot in the head by his brother-in-law...1990...Brooklyn Parks Commissioner Julius Siegal and several dignitaries attend the ribbon-cutting opening of the renovated Bildersee Playground...A 19-year-old East New York man is charged with the murder of an apparent innocent bystander during a melee following a Sweet 16 party in the Bay View Houses complex...An East 96th Street resident holds an alleged car thief at bay with a licensed hunting rifle until police arrive at the scene.

1965...A Canarsie mother of twins publicly expresses her thanks to two alert Con Edison linesmen who helped save the life of her 15-month-old girl when she suddenly stopped breathing...A final decision on the site for South Shore High School is said to be "immiment" following the testimony of local residents at a City Hall hearing...The Rt. Reverend Monsignor Vincent O. Genova of the Holy Family Roman Catholic Church receives the first Human Rights Award presented by Canarsie High School for his "35 years of devotion to interreligious and interracial harmony and understanding"...1969...City-bound rush hour commuters on the BMT Canarsie line, fed up with constant delays in service due largely to deteriorating 50-year-old subway trains, refuse to disembark following a breakdown at the Bedford Avenue station...Less than 2 months after he is assigned to a paratrooper unit in South Vietnam, Army Specialist 4th Class Ralph Santinello, of Avenue L, is killed in action during a combat mission...Running for reelection in November, Mayor John Lindsay and his Republican running mates appear at a local poilitical gathering...1973...A former resident of Canarsie-East New York with the appropriate name of Stanley Dyrector, writes and directs an acclaimed play in Los Angeles that appears headed for the silver screen...1977...Ben Dubose and his Canarsie family are the proud one-day owners of the Brooklyn Bridge, purchased at a charity auction for $1,000...1981...Joseph B. Samitz, 63, who co-published the Canarsie Courier since 1959 with his brother Bob, dies at his home on East 92nd Street...Urging a local crackdown on merchants who ignore the year-old law to keep the front of their stores litter free, "I love A Clean Canarsie's" Jules Soroken also suggests more summonses be issued to dog-litterers...1985...Former Canarsien Manny Jacobs, 16, who co-starred in the film, "Revenge of the Nerds," four years earlier, makes a guest appearance at the Jamaica Bay Library for a screening of that film...1989...Following up on a complaint of animal cruelty, a task force of ASPCA workers and police discover more than sixty cats and dogs living in horrible conditions in an East 86th Street house...After six months of old-fashioned police work, officers arrest an East 108th Street man suspected of gunning down a 24-year-old man outside an area bodega six months earlier...1993...The family of an elderly hit-and-run victim expresses its gratitude to the Good Samaritan who tried to aid the 88-year-old man after he was struck by a car and left to die at the intersection of Ralph and Flatlands Aveneus...1997...Local police start cracking down on so-called "social clubs" claiming that by targeting them may help cut other, more heinous crimes.

1964...The State Supreme Court approves a motion to condemn property on Rockaway Parkway so a municipal parking lot can be built on the site abutting the subway terminal...The Grace Protestant Church, observes its 125th anniversary of spiritual leadership in the community...1968...Two local teenagers are killed and six others are injured when their car swerves out of control and runs into a tree in Broad Channel, Queens...A local memorial service is held for an East 86th Street serviceman killed in combat in March while serving in Vietnam...A large contingent of local parents and teachers travel to Albany to demand legislators not vote for the proposed decentraliztion plan for New York City schools...1972...With the Transit Authority cracking down on drunks and derelicts loitering on subways, the police are accused of "dumping winos and drifters" here when the Canarsie BMT line ends its run at the Rockaway Parkway station...1976...A previously unnamed park on Seaview Avenue near East 108th Street is named for Canarsie Councilman Monroe Cohen, who died 16 months earlier...The sale of the Canarsie Cemetery is postponed giving hope that the city will designate it a landmark...The Canarsie Courier office moves down the block from Flatlands Avenue and East 92nd Street to 1142 East 92nd Street...1980...A Starrett City woman, whose son is one of the 50 American hostages being held in Iran, takes part in a special Memorial Day candlelight ceremony in the local shopping mall...1984...In just a few hours government surplus cheese and butter is given away to an overflow crowd of hundreds of waiting Canarsiens...1988...A traffic court judge dismisses summonses issued to 45 Canarsiens declaring that an area three-way traffic sign should be removed or clarified because it is "too ambiguous"...1992...Kings Plaza officials say they are "optimistic" despite the abrupt closing of Alexander's Department store an the finacial problems faced by Macy's, the two stores share ownership of the Mill Basin Mall...Police indicate that the man found dead in his car, with a gun lying on the front seat, at the westbound entrance to the Belt parkway is an apparent suicide...1996...Trying to maintain his dignity in the middle of what became a media event, Michael Hebranko, the 1,000 lb. man from Canarsie, is forklifted from his house into a waiting ambulance that transports him to a Manhattan hospital for treatment.

1959...The Port Authority is granted permission to lease an area along Rockaway Parkway, near the transit terminal, as a "park and ride" parking lot...1963...Ten days after a 24-year-old local nightwatchman is shot to death, two dozen detectives, including the victim's uncle, canvass the community looking for clues...1967...More than 50 angry demonstrators picket in front of Canarsie High School opposing the Board of Education's rezoning plan affecting local school children...Plans are announced by American Legion Post 573 and its ladies Auxiliary for the annual Memorial Day parade and ceremony at Canarsie Cemetery...Canarsian Paul Marvin, a 28-year-old  hospitalized patient with kidney disease, vows to join the battle to have save others with the same serious ailment...1971...A peace rally at Canarsie High School demanding the U.S. set a firm date for troops to withdraw from Vietnam is marred when two opponents get into a fistfight...1975...A 17-year-old student is stabbed in the back during an altercation with an unknown assailant outside Canarsie High School...1979...The Concerned Citizens of Canarsie schedule a day for a community-wide cleaning effort...1983...Due to citywide budget cuts, two Canarsie area libraries are "in contention" to be closed...An emotionally disturbed man in his late 20's is subdued by police at the Rockaway Parway subway station after he apparently castrated himself...Students at John Wilson JHS 211 create posters promoting the upcoming "Canarsie Clean-A-Thon"...1987...In an effort to rejuvenate the struggling, city-owned Canarsie Cemetary,  new plots are offered to the public for the first time in over a decade...More than 800 people attend School District's 18's first annual Education Conference...1991...After being contacted by the Interpol, the international police organization, detectives from the 69th Precinct arrest a 25-year-old Scottish citizen, who had been staying with relatives on East 95th Street, wanted for allegedly stabbing a man in London...1995...Three firefighters are slightly injured battling a second floor blaze in a house on Rockaway Parkway, near Farragut Road, just around the corner from their firehouse.

1962...Dangerous intersections from East 83rd to East 89th streets between Avenues L and M, are slated to get much needed stop signs...1966...Community and PTA leaders send an open letter to Mayor Lindsay protesting the job freeze that is forcing several library branches to close...1970...Thirty police officers are sent to Tilden High School to contain a disturbance among students that is beleived to be racially motivated...Falsetto-voiced Tiny Tim makes an appearance at the birthday party of a local youth whose father is the singer's manager...State Senator A. Frederick Meyerson receives a Police Department citation for coming to the aid of officers attempting to breakup a disturbance several months earlier, which resulted in his being stabbed...1974...As part of the opening ceremonies for the Gateway National Recreation Area, it is announced that a Conservation Festival, featuring noted folk singer Pete Seeger, will be presented on Canarsie Pier in late May...Three members of the 69th Precinct Auxiliary Unit are cited for thwarting and disarming two alleged thieves during an assault on a local resident...A three-alarm fire causes extensive structural damage to several stores in the Ralph Avenue Shopping Center...1978...Two busloads of Canarsie residents are among thousands from all over New York State who travel to Albany to urge legislators to override Governor Carey's recent capital punishment veto, which is subsequently upheld in court...Investigators say that an electrical wire dangling from an adjacent building was tha apparent "spark" that started a fire that ravaged the Avenue L shopping officers of David Price Realty...Four local Rabbis attend a White House reception commemorating the 30th anniversary of the State of Israel...1982...Revitalization of the Avenue L shopping district is once again the subject of discussion by merchants, who propose a "mall effect" along the street to spur buisness...To prevent a possible water shortage, the Department of Environmental Protection reminds citizens that lawn watering restrictions are still in effect, despite the fact reservoirs are at 100% capacity...A bevy of satellite dishes will soon be installed near Starrett City as Brooklyn's first cable television system gets approval for a site at Fountain and Flatlands Avenues...1986...A 46-year-old Starrett City resident, terminally ill with leukemia, jumps to his death in an apparent suicide...A New York State investigator, living in Canarsie, is arrested after he allegedly posed as a police officer and pulls over a plainclothes police officer, who was driving to work at the 69th Precinct...A Canarsie woman is implicated in an alleged scheme that siphoned an estimated $2 million from a Brooklyn Credit Union into her own taximeter company...1990...A junkyard owner is arrested after an alleged burgler is injured by a booby trap-bomb planted on his commercial property to stop would-be-robbers...An Emergency Services police officer is charged with the suffocation death of a Canarsie man he subdued when the suspect became violent while he was in custody at the 69th Precinct...The federal government allocates $12 million for the renovation of the Canarsie Pier, its parking lot and an overall spucing up of the immediate area...1994...Unsuspecting residents continue to be the victims of a rash of scams perpetrated in the area over the last month by a group of con artists.

1961...The Canarsie Courier publishes its 40th anniversary issue featuring a front page photograph of the four publishes who have run the weekly since it started...A 69th Precinct police officer is hailed as a hero for subduing an armed suspect, without firing a shot, who had been pointing a handgun at him...1965...Former boxer "Two Ton" Tony Galento, once a heavyweight contender, is the featured guest speaker at a local Lions Club meeting...1969...The 14th Street Canarsie-BMT subway line continues to accrue criticism, over constant delays, dilapidated equipment and inadequate facilities, with the Daily News dubbing it "The Toonerville Trolley"...A decorated marine combat veteran comes home on emergency leave from Vietnam to see his 4 1/2 year-old sister, who is suffering from an inoperable brain disease...1973...Police responding to an emergency call discover the body of a 28-year-old mother of two stabbed and strangled in her bedroom...A local resident serving as an Air Force pilot, is selected to particpate in Strategic Air Command missile combat games in North Dakota...1977...New York City Schools Chancellor Irving Anker voices his support for School District 18's opposition to State Education Commissioner Ewald Ntyquist's plan for "greater racial integration" in Canarsie's Junior High Schools...More than 300 "innovative and imaginative" exhibits are displayed at the P.S.115 Science Fair...1981...Three District 18 schools are selected as winners of cash awards in the Board of Education's first citywide Attendance Olympics...The transit authority prposes four new routes, including reinstatement of the KK line at Rockaway Parkway station...1985...Lisa Gottlieb, an alumnus of several Canarsie schools, directs her first feature film, "Just One of The Guys"...1989...A brigade of firefighters rushes to the 69th Precinct stationhouse to battle a rooftop blaze ignited by a spark from a propane fuel tank...A two-foot thick section of roadway along Avenue L, apparently weakened after a large truck passed over it, suddenly and without warning collapses, leaving a gaping 15-foot deep hole in the thoroughfare...The strangling death of a 62-year-old East 103rd Street woman is determined to be a suicide by detectives investigating the case...1993...A series of violent incidents, including one where two police officers are injured, erupts between groups of Bildersee students before and after school hours on the streets around the intermediate school...1997...According to the city, which operates Canarsie Cemetary, the rampant flooding problems that result following heavy rains is "beyond" repair...Port Authority cops nab a 22-year-old 69th Precinct murder suspect about to board a bus for North Carolina.

1960...The Canarsie Chamber of Commerce advocates extending B-6 bus service from Ralph Avenue along Flatlands Avenue to East 108th Street...1964...The city goes to court to aquire properties near the Rockaway Parkway subway station so they can create a municipal parking lot...The Board of Education reveals plans for a new local high school at an estimated cost of $7.8 million...1968...Seeds for a future Canarsie ambulance corps are planted as the First Canarsie League meets with city hospital officials expressing the growing need for improved ambulance service to the community...Mayor Lindsay kicks off "The Big Sweep of 1968" campaign by reminding Canarsiens and other residents to join a citywide effort by cleaning their sidewalks on May 3rd...1972...Councilman Monroe Cohen responds to a report in the Canarsie Courier that Fire Engine Co. 170, on Rockaway Parkway, urgently needs a replacement for the ineffective, outdated, nineteen year old hook-and-ladder truck it now uses...Community activist Murray Weiner, 49, dies of a heart attack at his East 71st home...Like his brother before him, Daryl Gershbein is bar-mitzvahed at the Western Wall in the holy city of Jerusalem...1980...Apathy seems to prevail in the community as residents show little interest in the upcoming school board elections...Nineteen-year-old Judy Berland of East 102nd Street vies for the title of Miss Brooklyn and a chance to represent New York State in next month's Miss USA Beauty Pageant...1984...Canarsie Pier is set to receive a face-lift and undergo major renovations in the coming months, including the opening of a seafood-steakhouse, with outdoor dining, owned and operated by restaurateur Frank Abbracciamento...The small park on East 95th Street is slated to be renamed and dedicated for slain 69th Precinct Police Officer Cecil Sledge in ceremonies on May 6...1988...Days after a two-alarm fire broke out in the Canarsie High School girls' gymnasium, fire marshals and other investigators declare the blaze was caused by arson...1992...After struggling with three assailants who were attempting to rob him, a 48-year-old East 81st man was murdered in front of his three children and a tenant...1996...The Canarsie Courier marks its 75th anniversary with a very special issue that reminisces about the community weekly's history.

1959...Parents from the Seaviw Homeowners Association announce the plans to visit the Board of Education to protest a proposal that would bus children to other area schools to alleviate overcrowding at P.S.279...A traffic light and "Yield Right of Way" sign are erected at the busy pedestrian intersection at Rockaway Parkway and Avenue M...1963 No injuries are reported following the containment of a blaze by local firefighters at a vacant service station at Remsen and Foster Avenues...Scores of commuters are treated for smoke inhalation following a smoky, electrical fire aboard a Canarsie-bound BMT subway train...1967 A fire and explosion rock the area when the gas tank of a 2 1/2 -ton crane explodes at an industrial steel plant on East 99th Street, sending firemen to the hospital with major and minor burns sustained after being sprayed by gasoline...1971...The Canarsie Courier, founded in 1921, celebrates its 50th anniversary...Governor Nelson Rockerfeller proposes legislation requiring welfare recipients to reside in New York for at least one year before they are eligible for state benefits...Over 250 new directional signs are installed as twenty-three streets are converted into one-way thoroughfares...1975...Anthony Genovesi is unanimously elected Democratic leader of the 39th Assembly District...Two children, who were missing overnight, are found safe and unharmed during a massive neighborhood search then reunited them with their families...Three men dressed in buisness suits swim to shore near the Mill Basin draw bridge after their seaplane flips over during take-off from Jamaica Bay...1979...Former Canarsie Courier publisher Edward Herrschaft, 90, who ran the newspaper from 1935 until he sold it to Bob and Joe Samitz in 1959, dies at his home in Queens...State Assembly woman Helene Weinstein co-sponsers pro-environment "Bottle Bill" legislation which authorizes a nickel deposit on some glass bottles...1983...A 61-year-old East 94th Street resident remains in critical condition three days after he was shot in the back by three youths attempting to rob him while walking on Conklin Avenue...1987...Police arrest two Canarsie teenagers within 24 hours after they allegedly robbed and shot a woman on Rockaway Parkway...1991...Fireman from three nearby companies battle an all-hands brush fire for several hours as the blaze destroys a large expanse of grasslands in Mill Basin and endangers an elementary school and a yacht club.

1962...Traffic Commissioner Henry Barnes announces that a survey will be conducted to determine the most convenient way to move the flow of traffic at Glenwood Road and Rockaway parkway...The local Chamber of Commerce reveals it has learned the new police precinct scheduled to be built on Foster Avenue has been delayed for a year...Some Avenue N residents ask the city planning commission to rezone their neighborhood, thereby restricting retail buisness from opening between East 84th and 85th Streets...1966...The demand for plots at Canarsie Cemetery surges as the Brooklyn Diocese approves burial for Catholics at nonsectarian cemeteries...Brooklyn Democratic leader Meade Esposito blats Mayor Lindsay for defying tradition by refusing to designate a Sunday School Union week...1970...Area residents plea to the Sanitation, claiming their garbage has not been collected for a week...Comrades and the community mourn the death of firefighter and lifelong Canarsien Arthur Denton...1974...The New York City Police Department enlist two-way radio medallion taxicabs, locally and citywide, to aid in an effort to increase the safety and welfare of New York's citizens...Gubenatorial candidate Hugh Carey and other Democratic Hopefuls speak to hundreds at a rally at the Thomas Jefferson Democratic Club...1978...Thomas and Lillie LaMarca, two octogenarians, who have lived in Canarsie for nearly half their lives, celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary...A former Canarsie High School varsity football player, living in Florida, helps local authorities capture a man he saw officers pursuing when he tackles the suspect, accused of murdering a Florida policeman...1982...Canarsie gears up for a week-long Clean-A-Thon organized by "I Love A Clean Canarsie" chairman Jules Soroken...A $20,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of anyone connected to the murder of Housing Police Officer James Carragher two months earlier in the Glenwood Houses...1986...Alternate-side-of-the-street parking regulations are reduced within Community Board 18 from three to one or two days a week for street cleaning...A 51-year-old Long Island man is found shot to death in his car on East 81st Street near Avenue J...1990...The daughter of a Canarsie woman killed in a hit-and-run collision claims that despite the fact that no arrests have been made yet, "the police know who the driver of the other car was"...A couple, whose East 91st Street house was firebombed two months earluer in what has been termed a "racially motivated" incident, receives an interest free bank loan to help them restore their home...1994...In the wake of a female office from the 69th Precinct allegedly beaten by three South Shore High School coeds, the principal calls it "an isolated incident."

1961...The Courier seeks photos and stories from Canarsiens in conjunction with the upcoming 40th anniversary issue...1965...After six false starts, Mayor Wagner and city commissioners claim they have "devised a new concept and approach" to the controversial Flatlands Industrial Park project...A 37-year-old Canarsie man, who is a survivor of a Polish concentration camp, returns from Germany where he was a witness in the trial of ten former Nazis...1969...Four unarmed security guards are assigned to Canarsie High School by the Board of Education to protect students and teachers...1973...A compromise is reached concerning the proposed busing of children into Canarsie, ending a month-long boycott of classes at several District 18 schools...A police rescue unit saves three Brooklyn men struggling in Jamaica Bay after their boat sinks about 400 feet from Canarsie Pier...1977...A special grand jury indicts a 27-year-old investigator for the Brooklyn District Attorney's office on a charge of second degree manslaughter in the death of a Mill Basin teen...Two Gateway Park police capture and arrest a 20-year-old Canarsie man, who was being sought for kidnapping and sexually assaulting a woman at gunpoint near Kings Plaza, just off the Rockaway Parkway exit of the Belt Parkway...1981...A federal plan to cancel national Park programs could mean an end to many activities in the gateway National Recreation Area, including Canarsie Pier...The overnight crew of the Canarsie Volunteer Ambulance Corps records its first ever delivery - a baby girl...Local homeowners and residents are reminded to curb water use as a citywide drought emergency enters its second week...1985...Reverend Thomas Anastasio, the pastor of the Curch of St.Jude, announces the Brooklyn bishop's approval for the construction of a new church building on the Seaview Anenue side of the current site...Eligible senior citizens and others line up for a free, two-day federal distribution of food staples, consisting of cheese, butter, flour and honey...1989...A 68-year-old man, reportedly distraught over an illness from which he is suffering, jumps to his death from his fourth floor Glenwood Houses apartment...In what authorities call a classic con game, an elderly woman allows two well-dressed woman into her house to use the bathroom, then realizes her jewlery is missing after they depart...1993...An elderly woman is bilked out of $3,000 by two woman in the most recent string of local con games...1997...A realtor handling Avenue L property claims that new stores may come to the economically-strapped shopping strip...School Board 18 decides to table, for now, three volatile and racially-motivated resolutions.

1960...A local civic organization spearheads a successful campaign for better public transportation which leads to the Transit Authority extending the route of the B-6 bus along Flatlands Anenue to East 80th Street...1964...The Board of Education postpones for one year the final decision on the "pairing" of two Canarsie elementary schools, under the Princeton Plan, for the purposes of integration...1968...Local clergyman from three faiths send unified Passover and Easter blessings to Canarsie servicemen in South Vietnam...At the urging of Brooklyn legislators, including local Democrats, the New York City Council allocates $65,000 for the proposed Canarsie Beach Park Development and Cultural Center...1972...A group of World War I and II veterans present a citation to Canarsien and assistant District Attorney Harry Brodbar for his "skillful prosecution" of flag desecration cases...1976...A 20-year-old ex-serviceman from Canarsie is sentanced to a minimum of 75 years in prison for the 1972 murders of three Canarsie teenagers in Queens...The Canarsie High School basketball team, which won the PSAL championship title in early March, is honered by Mayor Beame and other dignitaries at a City Hall ceremony...1980...A Canarsie man working for the Sanitation Department discovers a suspicious package outside the Cuban U.N. Mission that turns out to be a bomb, that is safely removed by the Police Bomb Squad...1984...Police announce an alert specifically for local senior citizens to warn them about "gypsies" who are conductiong local confidence games to defraud the elderly of their money...Wheelchair tennis pro Brad Parks visits Canarsie to offer the finer points of the game to P.S.279's special education students...1988...A "wolf pack" of ten youths, one as young as thirteen, are arrested by the 69th Precinct Anti-Crime Unit police, who spotted them robbing and beating a 69-year-old man at East 107th Street and Glenwood Road...Hundreds of friends and relatives of a 26-year-old Mill Basin bride-to-be attend her funeral several days after she was murdered in her gift shop off Avenue L...1992...A white Rockaway Parkway man is convicted, and three others are still being sought, in the 1991 razor-slashing attack, deemed racially motivated, of a 27-year-old black man and his 2-year-old daughter near Seaview Avenue and East 102nd Street...Eight Brooklyn residents and one Philadelphia man are arrested afterpolice and U.S.Marshalls raid an East 77th Street home and discover a cache of handguns, marijuana and $200,000.

1963...Local school children will be issued the Saban oral polio vaccine as part of the New York City Healh Department's ongoing immunization program...Tentative Board of Education rezoning plans, which would bus Brownsville pupils into the local district, anger many Canarsie parents...1967...Brookdale Hospital is surprised when the mother of the 150,000th baby born at the medical center, unexpectedly gives birth to twins...The son of a former Canarsie resident and buisness owner, Specialist 5th class Calvin Schwartz, attached to the Army Medical Corps, is killed in action in South Vietnam...1971...Local religious, civic and political leaders launch a petition campaign under the banner Concerned Canarsie Citizens for Soviet Jewry...Environmenalists, citing increased pollution and loss of valuable park lands, are angered over Govenor Nelson Rockerfeller's proposal to widen the Belt Parkway...Abe Zeitchick, chairman of the local planning board, is praised for his efforts to get the city to allocate funds for Canarsie High School...1975...An altered rezoning plan, called the Choice of Admissions Program, reduces the area from which future Canarsie High School students will come...1979...Mass is conducted by Brooklyn's Archbishop Francis J. Mugavero at Holy Family Church, to kick off its centennial celebration...a 35-year old German citizen near the completion of his cross-country excursion of the United States, proclaims "little old Canarsie is wunderbar," after exiting the Belt parkway and receiving extra special assistance from local police...1983...Police detectives say they have no clues to the identification of "an apparently Hispanic woman." whose partially-nude body was discovered in a muddy, marshy area of Georgetown...Hundreds watch as a police helicopter plucks two youngsters from a blazing fire, accidentally ignited by a rescue flare, on a small island off Canarsie Pier...1987...Two pistol-wielding men subdue an armed Central National Bank security guard and escape with an undisclosed amount of cash...1991...Firefighters from nine companies extinguish a raging inferno which destroys several acres of grasslands north of the Belt parkway that was allegedly started by a group of children reported in the vicinity just prior to the blaze...1995...An unidentified Good Samaritan witnesses a knifing then comes to the aid of the bleeding 19-year old victim, who tells police he was abducted off a local street then taken for a brief car ride before being assaulted and stabbed.

1961...A breakfast is held at Temple Emanu-El in honor of the Second Annual Brotherhood Week celebration...1965...A 16 year old is in the hospital recovering from stab wounds sustained when a young intruder broke into his house and attacked him...A local civic group urges the New York State legislature to ban over-the-counter cough and cold remedies after a series of articles in the Courier highlights increased use of the medicines by teenages attempting to get "high"...1969...More than 50 police officers are dispatched to Canarsie High School to quell an apparently racially-motivated clash between 200-300 black and white students...Mayor John Lindsay pledges the LL subway line will be "a top prority" after he tours the route and sees the deplorable conditions on it and at the Rockaway Parkway subway station...1973...Political and civic leaders join residents living in the Paerdegat section to hail the onset of a new bus route that reaches their community...To curb ongoing racial tensions at Canarsie High School, a "Brooklynites Against Racism" rally is scheduled...1977...24 year old Hank Cassai is featured in the fild documentary, "Pumping Iron," which also includes a then unknown Austrian by the name of Arnold Schwarzeneger...1981...An East 84th Street woman leads a successful campaign getting New York State to designate next January 8th as Elvis Presley Memorial Day...P.S.115 ranks ninth in the Board of Education's latest public school reading score rankings...1985...Using ancient artifacts, Canarsie historian Ben DuBose traces local Native American history back thousands of years...1989...Two Canarsie men are shot six times by an unknown masked assailant as they sit in a car at a red light at Remsen Avenue and Avenue K...1997...Canarsie High School is evacuated after a highly-toxic, foul-smelling garden pesticide is spilled by a student during a horticulture class.

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