New Street Name Honors Longtime Local Bishop

Editor's Note: this article was first published in the July edition of the Tremont Tribune, out and online now.

The section of Crotona Parkway in front of St. Thomas Aquinas Church is now
 Bishop Francisco Garmendia Place, in honor of the parish’s late pastor.
(Photo by Jeanmarie Evelly)

A busy stretch of Crotona Parkway was renamed last week to honor the late Bishop Garmendia Francisco, the first Hispanic bishop to serve the Archdiocese of New York and a longtime presence in East Tremont, known through the years for his work with the neighborhood’s new immigrant populations.

“He loved his people,” said Betty Cleary, who worked for years as Garmendia’s secretary. “He would go to door-to-door through the neighborhood. Everybody was his family.”

Happy Land Fire Remembered

Photos by Fausto Giovanny Pinto


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Last Friday, March 25 marked the 21st anniversary of the tragic fire at the Happy Land Social Club, on Southern Boulevard in East Tremont, where 87 people lost their lives after an arsonist set fire to the building.

Each year, Community Board 6 hosts a memorial mass at nearby St. Thomas Aquinas Parish and at the Happy Land memorial site. These pictures were taken during the service last week by Tremont Tribune reporter Fausto Giovanny Pinto.

Happy Land Fire Remembered

Visitors paid their respects at the Happy Land monument on Thursday

Thursday marked the 20th anniversary of the Happy Land Social Club fire, a blaze that killed 87 people in a nightclub on Southern Boulevard in East Tremont on March 25th, 1990. (More details on the fire here).

At dusk on Thursday evening, a crowd had gathered around the Happy Land monument just across the street from the former club. Family members placed flowers and lit candles next to photos of loved ones.