1st Alternate Side Parking Nabs 500 in December 1955

Vintage Postcard of the Loew’s Triboro Theater.

Get into a conversation with a longtime Queens resident and you're likely to discover a subscriber of the Long Island Star-Journal, a daily paper that informed the community about local and world news until it folded in 1968. A banner across the Star-Journal masthead reminded readers that the newspaper's name came from the merger of the Long Island Daily Star (1876) and the North Shore Daily Journal--The Flushing Journal (1841).

Welcome to December, 1955!

On December 1, more than 300 Jackson Heights and Corona car owners, caught in the middle of new alternate side parking regulations, were hopping mad.

Motorists were slapped with green traffic summonses as a squad of 17 policemen went through the area. Although the summonses called for a $15 fine, 112 of the owners had to pay an additional $10 as their cars were towed away. That first night, 72 “hopping mad” owners had reclaimed their cars at the pound at Maspeth.

The new regulations banned parking from 72nd Street to 93rd Street on the west side of streets and the north side of avenues between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Within a few days, the number of summonses had zoomed past 500.

Baseball great Honus Wagner.

Shopping for the holidays? Gertz offered plenty of parking. You had a choice of three free hours at their lot, or paying only five cents an hour at the new municipal parking facility in Downtown Flushing. Ads offered luxury coats, a $59.98 to $79.98 value in a “pre-holiday sale” (this was early December) for only $49.

Nearby, Abramson’s at Main and 37th Streets offered free parking at the lot at the rear of the store. Silk neckties were only $1.19 and men’s suits were $33. Their Main Street store also had imported, hand woven Harris tweed topcoats and overcoats.

The editorial page had an interesting question: “Should dope pushers get the electric chair?”. Answers were split by gender. Three men suggested the death penalty, saying that pushers should “not deserve to live” and that they “commit crimes worse than murder”. The two women questioned, a Bayside housewife and a Flushing homemaker, were a bit more charitable. While allowing that selling drugs to teenagers was “terribly serious”, they suggested leniency. They suggested that a life term was more appropriate than capital punishment.

Harry Howell, Hockey Hall of Fame member and member of the 1955 New York Rangers.

The Christmas season was in full swing at Gertz Basement Dollar Days, where you could phone an order in for as little as $3. Fields Basement at 37th Avenue and 82nd Street in Jackson Heights was open every night till 9:30 p.m.

Smilen Brothers Fruits and King Sal’s Meat Market at 33-15 Broadway, Astoria, were among purveyors of foods who advertised regularly in the Star-Journal. Large supermarkets at the time were IGA (pot roast for 39 cents a pound), Grand Union (sirloin steaks, 57 cents a pound), Bohack’s (leg of lamb, 53 cents a pound), and Food Fair (round roast at 69 cents a pound).

In 1955, professional sports had yet to grow into a big-time industry. The NBA had only eight teams in two divisions, and the NHL only six teams: Montreal, New York, Chicago, Toronto, Detroit and Boston. Professional football coverage was dominated by local high school and college basketball. A regular Star-Journal column featured hunting and fishing.

Posters for The Country Girl and The Snows of Kilimanjaro.

Baseball great Honus Wagner, age 81, died in his sleep in Pittsburgh. Considered by many to be the greatest shortstop of all time, he held the National League batting title eight times, and was a .300-plus hitter for 17 straight seasons. Wagner stole 720 bases, leading the league in extra base hits for seven years. He made only 612 errors for a .943 fielding average in his 21 years as a professional ball player. He never made more than $10,000 a year.

One eye-popping mid-month headline read “Reds Had ‘Underground Setup’ on Long Island”. John Lautner, a Communist from 1929 to 1950, testified in a trial of eight alleged local “Commies”. He outlined a secret party meeting at the Sunnyside apartment of former state chairman Robert Thompson to set up a network on Long Island for an undefined “emergency”. This network, which was to accommodate some 3,300 people, included safe houses, mail drops, and a radio receiver capable of picking up messages from anywhere in the world.

On December 5, in a terse, four-paragraph letter, the Port of New York Authority notified the owners of 43 houses near LaGuardia Airport that they had seven months to sell and vacate their homes. The owners, who were to be paid “fair market value”, had to leave so new lights could be installed near the airport.

Stunned homeowners reacted in shock and disbelief. “It’s our only home, it’s terribly disheartening” said one. Another responded to the development proposal: “I had this house built. I will fight to the last before I’ll give it up.” The president of the homeowners association reacted bitterly: “Three years ago they promised us that the runway would be in use only in emergencies and eventually done away with.” The Airline Diner, which had just opened the previous week, was also slated for demolition.

“Back by popular demand” at the Loew’s Triboro: Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly and William Holden in “The Country Girl”. At the Astoria, the Boulevard, and the Midway, Gregory Peck, Susan Hayward and Ava Gardener starred in “The Snows of Kilimanjaro”. At the Beacon, “Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy” was showing.

That’s the way it was in December, 1955.

Love your neighborhood? Then do your shopping at the Greater Astoria Historical Society. Holiday gift ideas include historical pictures of your community and books, mugs, tote bags and tee shirts with a local theme. Shop in person at the Society, which is open to the public on Saturdays, noon to four at the Quinn Gallery, 4th Floor, 35-20 Broadway, Long Island City, or order online at www.astorialic.org. For more information, call the Greater Astoria Historical Society at 718-278- 0700 or visit www.astorialic.org.