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An early-morning blaze tore through a Gravesend apartment building leaving ten injured, including three residents in critical conditions and six firefighters in need of minor treatment.

The fire began around 2:45 a.m. in the top floor of a six-story apartment building on Colby Street. It was contained to one apartment, occupied by two senior citizens. The residents are among those critically injured and being treated for smoke inhalation.

Several ladder companies raced to the scene, taking more than 45 minutes to battle the blaze. Residents of the building scrambled to evacuate, using the windows of first-floor apartments to exit to the courtyard. At least one man on a lower-level was reported to be in cardiac arrest.

The injured were taken to Lutheran Medical Center and Coney Island Hospital for treatment. No word on their condition.

More coverage:
10 hurt, 3 critically, in Brooklyn apartment fire [ABC]
Gravesend, Brooklyn Fire [FOX]
10 Injured in Brooklyn Fire [CBS]

A c.1896 lantern slide, courtesy of Joseph Ditta. It's the earliest known photo of the plot.

There’s a certain lexical contortion that must be performed when writing a headline to celebrate the anniversary of a historic cemetery. I began the headline with “Happy Birthday,” then figured “happy” was not appropriate. So I went with “morbid.” But then “birthday” sounded way off, so I changed it to “deathday,” but nothing seemed right about that. So I went with “anniversary.”

Although language may bar my ability to create a proper phrase to capture the day, it doesn’t stop facts from being facts. Yesterday marked the 360th anniversary of the first recorded burial in the town of Gravesend – and possibly within the current confines of the Gravesend Cemetery, according to Gravesend historian Joseph Ditta.

(Read our August 2009 Q&A with Ditta about Gravesend’s history and preservation.)

The burial of the unnamed infant son of William Wilkins took place on August 18, 1650. This first interment occurred seven years after Gravesend was settled by former English subjects under Lady Deborah Moody on land granted to them by the Dutch governor of New Amsterdam. It took eight more years for the graveyard to take on more officious boundaries, when a resident offered 20 guilders – Dutch gold coins – to fence in the southwest corner of the village, which constituted the cemetery.

But if you go today, don’t expect to see the Wilkins baby’s tombstone. The earliest surviving stone marker is marked 1724, and the oldest legible stone dates to 1768. Still, that’s mighty old.

And speaking of going today, your opportunity is coming. Locals are lucky to have the knowledgeable (and eminently friendly) Joe Ditta presenting a pre-Halloween tour of the area on Sunday, October 24 at 11:00 a.m.

The tour will cover more than 250 years of the cemetery’s history, and is filled with all the intrigue reflective of the city’s twisted growth. Hear about murder-suicides, possible poisonings, and the warped burials of Coney Island sideshow freaks.

The tour is being given in conjunction with the Salt Marsh Alliance (based in Marine Park) and its resident History Club. (For information, see http://www.saltmarshalliance.org/ or call 718-421-2021.) Also, check out the Facebook fan page for Ditta’s book, Gravesend, Brooklyn, and the tour’s event invitation.

The original version of this article said the settlers were Quakers. This is incorrect. Lady Moody was an Anabaptist.

This really has very little to do with neighborhood news, but sometimes these things irk me. And I have a soapbox. So I’ll abuse it.

On Monday, we told you about Lance Stephenson, the former Lincoln High School basketball star and Indiana Pacers rookie that tossed his girlfriend down some stairs. At the end of the article, we had to ask, “Do you think the New York Post would’ve repeatedly referred to Jasmine Williams as Stephenson’s ‘baby mama’ if he were not black?” Well, our question fell on deaf ears, as they published at least four more reports using the arguably racist term.

Now we’ve got more eyebrow-raising reporting, as the fawning sportswriters over at the Daily News forget just who it is that’s the victim. They questioned Sebastian Telfair, another Lincoln H.S. basketball alum, about advice for Stephenson to overcome the apparent hurdles of his abusive, shithead nature.

Telfair says the Indiana Pacers rookie can bounce back as long as he owns up to his actions.

“He has to understand that it’s a mistake he made, and the quicker he gets over it, the better off he’ll be in life,” Telfair told the Daily News Wednesday evening at the Most Precious Blood community center in Gravesend, Brooklyn, where he treated nearly 150 kids and coaches from his 3T Family basketball tournament to trophies, food and refreshments. “Sometimes we go through things, we make mistakes and we dwell on it for too long. I hope he knows (Sunday’s incident) doesn’t make who he is as a person. He’s going to show his character as a good person, which I know he is. He’ll be all right.”

…

“It’s an unfortunate situation, but this isn’t the first obstacle he’s had to jump over,” Telfair said. “I’m sure he’ll get through it and come out strong. He has a lot of talent and with the opportunity, he’ll be able to do great things for himself.”

Wouldn’t “Stop beating your girlfriend” be better advice? This isn’t just one mistake Stephenson made. It’s just the one he got caught on. Family friends said Williams has been the victim of his temper before.

Daily News’ reporting almost left me feeling bad – sympathetic even – for this douchebag. How will he ever bounce back from this cosmic tragedy baring down on his life and career? How?!

Oh, then I remembered this maggot is the one that caused his own problems, and he physically hurt someone else in doing it. And he still gets to walk away with his $1.5 million contract.

Boo. F’ing. Hoo.

Source: NYPost.com

From the NY Post:

Former HS hoops star busted for allegedly pushing baby mama down stairs

Former city high-school hoops phenom Lance Stephenson — who just went pro in the NBA — was busted yesterday for pushing his baby mama down the stairs of her Brooklyn home, cops said.

The 6-foot-5, 210-pound Stephenson — who holds the state record for scoring and who led Lincoln HS in Brooklyn to four city championships — was charged with felony assault, weapons possession and other raps after the 5:05 a.m. violence on the stairwell of gal pal Jasmine Williams’ Gravesend home, authorities said.

Williams, 21, with whom Stephenson has a child, told cops that he pushed her down 10 steps and she struck her head.

Keep reading for the rest of the story, and see what question I raise about the reporting.

A subway operator failed to search adequately for the body of a commuter that fell between cars, clearing the way for 10 more trains to run it over before being discovered, a report from the New York Post reveals.

The incident occurred on March 28 at the Kings Highway station of the N train, in Gravesend.

Here’s the story from the Post:

The tragedy unfolded as Arabell Lin, 25, who has a prosthetic right leg, was walking between the cars of a Coney Island-bound N train on March 28.

After she fell, she hit a device on one of the cars that triggers the emergency brake when the train encounters an obstruction.

The operator, whose name was not released, got out of the cab and spent seven minutes walking up and down the track, looking under each car for whatever caused the train to stop.

Then the operator climbed aboard and continued the trip.

Keep reading to find out what happened next.

Courtesy of niznoz via Flickr

Con Edison is asking customers in Gravesend, Manhattan Beach, Coney Island and Seagate to scale back on power usage while repairs are made throughout the day.

The company is reducing the power supply by 5 percent to some 27,000 households in order to keep stress off the system as they go about emergency repairs. Con Edison is urging customers to turn off all non-essential items, and say things will be back to normal by 2 a.m.

The company reduced power to several Southern Brooklyn neighborhoods during last week’s heat wave, as it coped with near record-shattering power demand.

At least one inspector with the Department of Buildings can’t be bought. This honest worker reported two men to the city’s Department of Investigation after they allegedly tried bribing him with $5,000 to overlook illegal construction in a Gravesend home.

As reported by the Brooklyn Eagle, Shu Ming Li, of Brooklyn, and his partner in crime, You Q. Liang, of Manhattan, tried to get the building’s inspector to look the other way as they went on to convert the home’s basement into an apartment without filing any paperwork with the agency. Too bad for them they got the wrong inspector. He reported them and now they face up to seven years in prison.

Maybe they would have had better luck if they upped the ante and offered more money. Five grand is nice and all, but with a state shutdown on the way, the Department of Buildings must find a way to bankroll their continued inadequacy.

Courtesy of kirkclimber via Flickr

There’s no shortage of anger against the MTA’s proposed bus cuts, and now one local bread-biz is slamming the agency’s half-baked idea.

Bread Plus is outraged about the MTA’s failure to provide adequate time to comment on the proposed cut to the B64 line, which runs in front of their business. So to let residents cut through their frustration, they’re baking a giant MTA bread loaf and inviting neighbors to slice away. The protest is not only against the cut, which they say will hurt their business, but also in support of a proposed bill by Assemblyman William Colton (Bensonhurst, Gravesend, Bath Beach, Dyker Heights and Midwood).

Colton’s eminently sensible bill requires the MTA to notify local community boards of changes that will affect their residents. The idea – so obvious that it’s hard to believe they weren’t already required to do so – will hopefully put useful information in the hands of community leaders, who will be more effective at disseminating to constituents.

“Unfortunately, the MTA was not mandated to do so before, and you see the horrendous results that happened,” Colton said. “The MTA must be receptive and responsible to the riders. Let them stop taking their many chauffeured limousines and see how they like walking the extra blocks they force their riders to do.”

The protest takes place today at 11 a.m. at the bus stop in front of the Bread Plus bakery at 2851 Harway Avenue (off of Bay 50th Street). The MTA is cutting B64 bus service along Harway Avenue south of 25th Avenue to Stillwell Avenue terminal. The cut will affect residents of several senior homes, as well as students and employees of John Dewey High School.

Photo by Ray Johnson

Now that the Sanitation Department has admitted they don’t care about our streets, we need to begin considering creative solutions to the ever-worsening garbage issue in Sheepshead Bay. Last week, I wrote to Community Board 15 Chair Theresa Scavo:

What would it take to get rid of the public trash cans in the neighborhood, as they’re trying to do elsewhere? Is there a way we can do a trial period (so we can get the cans back if we want them)?

My thinking was that we could try the tactic being used in Community Board 11, which covers Bath Beach, Gravesend and Bensonhurst. In those neighborhoods, the Board asked the city to remove all the cans, and they say the garbage was gone after a few weeks. I’ve asked before if this is a smart idea, since we have some unique issues regarding illegal dumping and commuters. But still, something needs to be done, and, well, there is a logic to the idea that if you don’t have trash cans, they can’t overflow (and residents can’t put their home garbage there).

Click to see Scavo’s response

Signs for Lake & 86th Streets hang quite low. (Photo by Ray Johnson)

The street signs at the intersection of Lake Street and 86th Street are hanging quite low on the sign pole. The signs are either not attached securely, thus, causing them to slip, or they have been placed there specifically by DOT officials. Whatever the reason, drivers and pedestrians visiting the Gravesend/Bensonhurst neighborhood are confused when trying to figure out the street names.

Does anyone know why these signs would be so low on the pole? Are they just pole dancing very, very slowly?