Edward Charles "Whitey" Ford (1928 - 2020) was a Hall of Fame Yankee pitcher from Queens who grew up playing baseball in the sandlots of Astoria before going pro; he was raised on the block now named after him. Ford made his major league debut pitching for the Yankees in 1950 and spent his entire career with the team. He helped the Yankees win six World Series titles and 11 American League pennants in his 16 seasons. He had a career record of 236-106, setting the Yankees’ record for victories. He was the Cy Young Award winner in 1961 and was a 10-time All-Star. His 10 World Series victories are the most for any pitcher. He pitched thirty-three and two-third consecutive scoreless innings in World Series play, breaking Babe Ruth’s record. He also holds the record for World Series starts with twenty-two, innings pitched with 146 and strikeouts with 94. "Whitey" Ford was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974.

Peter G. Van Alst (1828 – 1900) was a surveyor who helped to build the roads and infrastructure of western Queens. Van Alst was born in Dutch Kills on May 28, 1828, and was a member of the large extended Van Alst family, a prominent Dutch farming family who moved to the area in the early 1700s and resided there until the 1870s, when they spread out and moved elsewhere. Van Alst received his education at the District School and the Astoria Institute. He apprenticed as a surveyor for a few years, and worked independently until 1872, when the city legislature appointed him to serve as a commissioner, surveying and supervising the construction of several roads in Long Island City, Queens. In 1874, Van Alst and three fellow Long Island City citizens comprised the First Ward Improvement Commission, which was in charge of raising the grades of Jackson Avenue from Vernon Avenue to the courthouse from three to eight feet, which profoundly affected the daily life of the city. Van Alst’s job consisted primarily of constructing maps, which revealed detailed organizations of street lines, grades, and sewage lines of the Long Island City area.

James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael (Mickey) Schwerner were three civil rights workers who were murdered in Mississippi in June 1964, where they were volunteering for the Freedom Summer Project. At the time of their deaths, Goodman was a student at Queens College and Schwerner’s brother, Steve Schwerner, was the director of the college’s counseling program. The three men were primarily involved in registering Black voters, but on the day of their disappearance were investigating the burning of a Black church that had been used for voter registration. They were abducted near the town of Philadelphia, Mississippi, and the case was initially treated as a missing persons investigation. After two months, their bodies were discovered; members of the KKK as well as local law enforcement were charged with the killings, but only seven of 18 defendants were convicted, on lesser charges of conspiracy. However, the case was reopened in 2004 after new evidence came to light and one defendant, Edgar Ray Killen, was convicted of three counts of manslaughter. He died in prison in 2018 at the age of 92. The Chaney-Goodman-Schwerner Clock Tower sits atop the Benjamin S. Rosenthal Library on the campus of Queens College. It was dedicated to the three men in 1989, shortly after the library's construction. A campaign to furnish the tower with a real bell carillon, rather than electronic chimes, was spearheaded by Queens College music professor David S. Walker, and a five-bell peal was commissioned and cast at the Royal Eijsbouts Bell Foundry in the Netherlands. The carillon was dedicated in November 1990.

Geraldine Anne Ferraro (1935–2011) was the first woman nominated for vice president by a major U.S. political party and the first Italian American to run on a national ticket. She served as Walter Mondale’s Democratic running mate in the 1984 presidential election, though they ultimately lost the race. Earlier in her career, she taught in Astoria, Queens, while attending Fordham University Law School at night. She passed the bar in 1960, the same year she married John Zaccaro. In 1978, the mother of three was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, where she represented New York’s 9th District in Queens from 1979 to 1985.

Patrick Collins was an Irish-American from Woodside who died on a European battlefield during World War 1.

Lewis Howard Latimer was an African American inventor and humanist. Born free in Massachusetts, Latimer was the son of fugitive slaves George Latimer and Rebecca Smith, who escaped from Virginia to Boston in 1842. Upon arrival, George Latimer was captured and imprisoned, which became a pivotal case for the abolitionist movement in Massachusetts. His arrest and the ensuing court hearings spurred multiple meetings and a publication, “The Latimer Journal and the North Star,” involving abolitionists like Frederick Douglass. The large collective effort eventually gained George his freedom by November 1842. Against this backdrop, Lewis Latimer was born in 1848. Latimer’s young life was full of upheaval as his family moved from town to town while tensions in the country continued to mount before the Civil War broke out in 1861. In 1864, Latimer joined the Union Navy at age 16. After the conclusion of the war, Latimer was determined to overcome his lack of formal education; he taught himself mechanical drawing and became an expert draftsman while working at a patent law office. He went on to work with three of the greatest scientific inventors in American history: Alexander Graham Bell, Hiram S. Maxim and Thomas Alva Edison. Latimer played a critical role in the development of the telephone and, as Edison’s chief draftsman, he invented and patented the carbon filament, a significant improvement in the production of the incandescent light bulb. As an expert, Latimer was also called to testify on a number of patent infringement cases. Outside of his professional life, Latimer wrote and published poems, painted and played the violin. He was one of the founders of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Queens and was among the first Civil War veterans to join the Grand Army of the Republic fraternal organization. He also taught English to immigrants at the Henry Street Settlement. The Lewis H. Latimer House is a modest Queen Anne-style, wood-frame suburban residence constructed between 1887 and 1889. Latimer lived in the house from 1903 until his death in 1928. The house remained in the Latimer family until 1963 when, threatened with demolition, it was moved from Holly Avenue to its present location in 1988. In 1993, it was designated a New York City Landmark. The historic house now serves as a museum that shares Lewis Latimer’s story with the public and offers a variety of free educational programs. The Latimer House is owned by the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, operated by the Lewis H. Latimer Fund Inc., and is a member of the Historic House Trust.

Greg Stein (1948-2021) was an LGBTQIA+ rights and AIDs advocate in Queens. He served as a treasurer for the Queens Lesbian and Gay Pride Committee for more than two decades and was treasurer of the AIDS Center of Queens County nearly from its inception. Stein served on the board and volunteered for the Lesbian and Gay Democratic Club of Queens. In a 2018 Queens Memory Project oral history interview, Stein described how the experience of having friends with HIV inspired him to become an AIDS and LGBTQIA+ advocate. Stein taught math at Russell Sage Junior High School in Forest Hills, was a member of the Phi Kappa Theta fraternity, and served as a lectern at Queen of Angels Church in Sunnyside.

Manuel de Dios Unanue (1943-1992) was a Cuban-born journalist and radio host who was killed in New York City in 1992. De Dios was born in Cuba in 1943 and moved to the United States in 1973, after time spent in Spain and Puerto Rico, he settled in Elmhurst, Queens. He worked as a journalist for several Spanish-language newspapers in New York City, before becoming editor-in-chief of El Diario La Prensa, the largest Spanish-Language newspaper in NYC, in 1984. De Dios was best known for his investigative reporting on the Colombian drug trade. He wrote extensively about the drug cartels that operated in Queens, and he named names. His reporting made him a target of the drug traffickers, and he was slain on March 11, 1992, by a hitman for the Colombian drug cartel in the Meson Asturias restaurant on 83rd Street in Queens.

Marie Curie (1867-1934) was a noted scientist and the first woman to win a Nobel Prize in Physics. Born in Warsaw, Poland, Maria Skolodowska-Curie moved to Paris in 1891 to study at the Sorbonne. Soon after, she joined a research laboratory and in 1898, she and her husband Pierre expanded on Henri Becquerel’s discovery of radioactivity, discovering two new elements, Polonium and Radium. This discovery earned Curie her first Nobel Prize, in Physics. She won a second Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1911, becoming the first person to earn two such awards. Curie died in France in 1934 from leukemia, thought to be caused by exposure to radiation. Marie Curie Playground opened September 6, 1956, as a jointly operated playground at J.H.S. 158. Jointly operated playgrounds are under the jurisdiction of the Board of Education and maintained by Parks, so that parklands serve an adjacent school site’s recreational needs as well as the general public. In 1985 the park was renamed for Curie, and later renovations pay tribute to her career: an atom motif is featured in the spray showers, and the hopscotch grid is patterned after a chemistry table. Several plaques also feature Curie’s achievements and quotes.

Abigail Adams (1744-1818), was the wife of John Adams, patriot leader, lawyer and second president of the United States. She was a patriot in her own right and a supporter of education for women. She married John Adams in 1764. From 17874 to 1784, she raised four children alone and ran the family farm. Her son, John Quincy Adams, was the sixth President of the United States.

Marguerite Henderson was very dedicated to her family, seniors and the East Elmhurst community. She attended P.S. 127 in East Elmhurst and went to I.S. 145, Newtown High School, and graduated from LaGuardia Community College. She was a member of Mt. Olivet Church where she was an active choir member. She joined the First Baptist Church and became an active member of the church’s trustee ministry. She was also involved in the East Elmhurst Community Board. She was dedicated to the families and seniors in East Elmhurst, ensuring they had food and resources as part of the First Baptist Church food pantry ministry. From organizing and executing back-to-school giveaways and toy and coat drives during the holidays, to serving thousands of families on a weekly basis before and during the height of the pandemic, she was truly dedicated to her community. She also assisted many families financially, helping with bills, rent, food and shopping for their children. She spent hours talking to teenagers and counseling the neighborhood youth who were at risk of heading in the wrong direction. She was very protective of her family, specifically her children and grandchildren. Everyone on 96th Street and the East Elmhurst/Corona community knew Marguerite and was often affectionately called all sorts of nicknames by her loved ones and friends: Margret, Ursel, Big Marg, Gangsta Boo, Boo Thang, Baby Cakes, Ma, “Reet,” Babe, Mama Marguerite, sweet sweet Marguerite, Gramma and the East Elmhurst General. She was steadfast in her commitment and thanks to her dedication, many families had food on the table, coats for the winter, school supplies for their children, and most of all her love showing them that Marguerite had their back, especially throughout one of the worst pandemics of recent times.

Carlos Lillo (1963-2001), a paramedic, was killed while assisting in rescue operations on September 11, 2001, following the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.

Gwen Ifill (1955-2016) was a trailblazing journalist who covered the White House, Congress and national election campaigns. She was the first Black woman to anchor a national TV public affairs show, Washington Week. Though she held positions with The Washington Post, The New York Times and NBC, she spent most of her career at PBS. She worked at PBS NewsHour for 17 years, and along with Judy Woodruff, was on the first all-woman anchor team on network nightly news. Ifill was born in Jamaica, Queens, and lived in several different cities throughout New England, Pennsylvania and New York, due to her father’s work as a minister. She attended Simmons College in Boston and majored in communications. Her first journalism experience was as an intern at the Boston Herald newspaper in her senior year of college, and she subsequently began working at the newspaper full-time in 1977. Until her untimely death from cancer at the age of 61, Ifill had a prolific career as a journalist for more than 30 years. The former Railroad Park was renamed Gwen Ifill Park on June 16, 2021.

Harry Eichler (1911-1984) was an administrative assistant to Representative, Joseph P. Addabbo (a Democrat of Queens) for 10 years. He was a graduate of Fordham University's College of Pharmacy and was active in a number of civic organizations in Queens. Eichler was a former president of the Richmond Hill Rotary Club and the Interfaith Council of Southwest Queens. He was a founder and vice president of the South Queens Boys Club.

Staff Sargent Edward R. Miller (1918-1944) lived in Glendale, Queens. He served as in the US Army in Africa, Sicily, and Normandy. He was killed in action in the Battle of Hürtgen Forest in Germany on November 22, 1944 at age 26.

Lance Corporal Michael D. Glover (1978-2006), a native of Belle Harbor, died during combat operations in Iraq as part of the Marine Forces Reserve. Born January 19, 1978, Glover grew up on Beach 134th Street, moving to Garden City, NY when he was 6 years old. He graduated from Xavier High School and then studied business at the University of Albany, graduating in 2001. He spent a year at Pace Law, but dropped out to join the Marines in 2004, as a response to how he felt following the attacks of September 11, 2001. The attacks impacted him and his community deeply. His uncle, Peter Hayden, was a fire chief who led rescue operations at the site, and one of his close friends who worked in the World Trade Center died during the attack. He sought out opportunities to help throughout his life. After Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, he drove to the city with supplies and helped with boat rescues, for which he was awarded the Navy And Marine Corps Achievement Medal. Assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 25th Marine Regiment, 4th Marine Division, Marine Forces Reserve in Albany, he was on patrol in Al Anbar Province, Iraq on August 16, 2006 when he and his platoon commander, Captain John McKenna of Brooklyn, were surprised by insurgent fire and killed. Glover was loved by many. He had a tight-knit family and developed friendships during every period of his life. Hundreds of community members came out to honor him for his funeral services at Saint Francis De Sales Church in Belle Harbor on August 26, 2006. This street near his childhood home, at Beach 134th St at the corner of Beach Channel Drive, was named in his honor on August 3, 2013, and is just one of a few memorials to Glover in the area. There is also a flag pole located near the corner of Beach 129th Street and Newport Avenue was dedicated to him on June 14, 2024.

Robert F. Kennedy (1925-1968) was a lawyer and politician who served in the administration of his brother, President John F. Kennedy, as attorney general and a key presidential advisor from 1961 to 1963. In that time, Robert fought organized crime and was an instrumental supporter of the Civil Rights movement. He left the administration in 1964, the year following President Kennedy’s assassination. From 1965 to 1968, Robert represented New York in the U.S. Senate, where he continued to advocate for human rights and the economically disadvantaged, while opposing racial discrimination and the nation’s deepening involvement in the Vietnam War. On June 5, 1968, while campaigning in Los Angeles for the Democratic presidential nomination, Kennedy was shot several times by gunman Sirhan Sirhan. He died the following day at age 42. Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, Robert was the seventh of nine children born to businessman and financier Joseph P. Kennedy and Rose (Fitzgerald) Kennedy, the daughter of the mayor of Boston. After serving in the navy in World War II, Robert graduated from Harvard in 1948 and earned his law degree from the University of Virginia in 1951. In 1950, he married Ethel Skakel, and the couple had eleven children together. Following law school, Robert joined the U.S. Department of Justice’s Criminal Division, leaving in 1952 to manage his brother John’s successful campaign for the U.S. Senate from Massachusetts. In 1953, Robert was an assistant counsel to the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, headed by Joseph R. McCarthy, but left the position because of his opposition to unjust investigative tactics. In 1957, he began to help investigate corruption in trade unions as Chief Counsel for the Senate Rackets Committee, resigning in 1960 to help run his brother’s presidential campaign. Robert is buried in Arlington National Cemetery, adjacent to the gravesite of President Kennedy. Robert F. Kennedy Community High School is located at 75-40 Parsons Boulevard in Flushing. Other locations in Queens also named in recognition of his public service are Robert F. Kennedy Hall on the campus of Queensborough Community College and Robert F. Kennedy Bridge (formerly the Triborough Bridge).

Officer Disdale Enton, a four-year veteran of the NYPD, was assigned to the 113th Precinct. He collapsed and died on August 28, 2002, after suffering a brain aneurysm while chasing a suspect in Jamaica, Queens.

Don McCallian (1934-2019) was a Sunnyside civic leader. He was a member of Community Board 2, vice president of the NYPD 108th Precinct Community Council and former president of the United Forties Civic Association. He was also a member of numerous clubs such as the Sunnyside-Woodside Lions Club, the Kiwanis Club, the Sunnyside Chamber of Commerce and the Sunnyside Community Services. He was a long-time parishioner at St. Raphael’s Church and was a very active volunteer at the church’s food pantry.

Elmer Ebenezer Studley (1869 - 1942) was an American lawyer and politician from New York. From 1933 to 1935, he served one term in the U.S. House of Representatives. Studley was born on a farm near East Ashford, Cattaraugus County, N.Y. in 1869. He went to local schools before attending Cornell University which he graduated from in 1894. He was a reporter for Buffalo newspapers in 1894 and 1895, and studied law, passing the bar in 1895 and began his practice in Buffalo. He was commissioned as a first lieutenant in the Two Hundred and Second Regiment, New York Volunteer Infantry, serving in the Spanish American War in 1898 and 1899. After the war he moved to New Mexico where he practiced law and began to get involved in politics until 1917, when he moved to New York City. He continued to practice law in New York and became Deputy New York State Attorney General in 1924 and was United States commissioner for the Eastern District of New York in 1925 and 1926. In 1932, he was elected at-large as a Democrat to the 73rd United States Congress, holding office from March 4, 1933, to January 3, 1935. Afterwards he resumed the practice of law. In February 1935 he was appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt as a member of the Board of Veterans' Appeals and served until his death in 1942. Studley is buried at the Flushing Cemetery.

Manuel de Dios Unanue (1943-1992) was a Cuban-born journalist and radio host who was killed in New York City in 1992. De Dios was born in Cuba in 1943 and moved to the United States in 1973, after time spent in Spain and Puerto Rico, he settled in Elmhurst, Queens. He worked as a journalist for several Spanish-language newspapers in New York City, before becoming editor-in-chief of El Diario La Prensa, the largest Spanish-Language newspaper in NYC, in 1984. De Dios was best known for his investigative reporting on the Colombian drug trade. He wrote extensively about the drug cartels that operated in Queens, and he named names. His reporting made him a target of the drug traffickers, and he was slain on March 11, 1992, by a hitman for the Colombian drug cartel in the Meson Asturias restaurant on 83rd Street in Queens. This small park on the border of Jackson Heights and Elmhurst in Queens was named in his honor in 1993.

Richard Cecere (1943-2007) was born and raised in Jackson Heights and was a Community Board 3 chairman and civic activist. A few of Cecere’s projects with the community board were geographic information mapping of the ethnicities in the area, research on small immigrant businesses, and studying the effects bringing the 2012 Olympics to New York would have had on Queens. He was known for his forward-thinking, progressive nature. In addition to his work with CB3, Cecere served as President of the Jackson Heights Kiwanis Club, President of the John F. Kennedy Democratic Club, and was an active member of the New Visions Democratic Club, the Newtown Senior Center in Elmhurst, and the United Community Civic Association. Cecere was known for his love of doo-wop and once hosted a radio show dedicated to it.

John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963) was the 35th President of the United States (1961-1963), and the youngest man and first Roman Catholic elected to the office. On November 22, 1963, when he was hardly past his first thousand days in office, he was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, becoming also the youngest president to die. Kennedy Airport, often referred to by its three-letter code JFK, is the largest airport in the New York metropolitan area. Construction of the facility began in 1942 on the former site of Idlewild Golf Course; hence it was initially called Idlewild Airport. When it opened on July 1, 1948, it was officially named New York International Airport but continued to be popularly called Idlewild. It was renamed John F. Kennedy International Airport on December 24, 1963, following the assassination of President Kennedy the prior month.

Patrolman Joseph W. Norden (1916-1954), a Marine veteran who served in combat in the Pacific during World War II, was a five-year veteran of the New York Police Department when he was killed at the age of 38 in the line of duty on December 3, 1954. That night, Norden and his partner, who worked for the 104th Precinct, reported to a home where an ambulance required assistance removing a man in emotional distress. The man appeared calm, so the officers held him by the arms to descend the stairs, rather than restraining him any further. At the ground level, however, the man lunged at Norden, grabbing his revolver and firing three shots that killed Norden and the ambulance worker. Norden's partner then fired at the shooter, killing him. Norden was survived by his two daughters, then 7-year-old daughter Susan, 4-year-old daughter Mary, and his wife, Theresa, whom he had married in 1946. She was three months pregnant at the time of his death, and that daughter, Jody Norden Castro, grew up in a home that worked to ensure she always remembered her father. At the time of his death, Norden and his family lived at 62-15 Catalpa Avenue. The nearby intersection was co-named in his honor on Saturday, September 28, 2024 following a bill for the name change that was sponsored by Councilmember Robert F. Holden.

In the course of his 25 years in politics, Joseph Addabbo (1925-1986) won respect from his colleagues, constituents and community for his ability to be just, compassionate and effective. A lifelong resident of Ozone Park, he was educated at City College and St. John’s University, where he received his law degree in 1946. Addabbo began his career as a lawyer. First elected to represent the 6th District in Queens in 1960, Addabbo, a Democrat, was re-elected to Congress 12 times. He supported legislation to benefit the elderly, education, small businesses, veterans benefits, and appropriation of funds for economically depressed areas. As Chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense (1979-1986), Addabbo played a powerful role in both shaping and challenging national defense policy. He worked to curb defense spending, sponsored legislation to halt the Vietnam War, and advocated a nuclear freeze while at the same time bolstering defense contracts for New York. Addabbo served in Congress until he died on April 10, 1986. The 12-story Joseph P. Addabbo Federal Building was constructed in 1989 and currently houses offices of the Social Security Administration, among other tenants.

Enoch Hawthorne Gregory (1936-2000), aka “The Dixie Drifter,” was born in Hertford, North Carolina. He served in the United States Army 10 the 1950s and received an honorable discharge. Gregory was a legendary soul DJ at WWRL in Woodside, Queens in the 1960s and 70s. He was also and one of WWRL's first African-American program directors and organized the scheduled the station’s music, commercials, and news. WWRL was one of the first successful Soul R\&B stations in the City and a premier radio station serving the City’s black community. A musician in his own right, he released an album, topped by the single Soul Heaven, which charted at number eight on Billboard’s R\&B Singles in 1965.

Roy Wilkins (1901-1981) was a Civil Rights activist and NAACP leader. In his early days, he became the editor of the Kansas City Call in 1923, a weekly newspaper serving the Black community of Kansas City, Missouri. He also helped organize the historic March on Washington in August 1963 and participated in the Selma-to-Montgomery marches in 1965 and the March Against Fear in Mississippi in 1966. Under Wilkins's direction, NAACP played a major role in many civil rights victories of the 1950s and 1960s, including Brown v. Board of Education, the Civil Rights Act, and the Voting Rights Act.

William H. Pease, Jr. (1921-2004) was a professor, a former engineer, and an advocate of the study of African American history. He served in the United States Army Air Corps as a weather observer during WWII and was stationed for a period in Tuskegee, Alabama as part of the Tuskegee Airmen. He won accolades as the Tuskegee Airmen welterweight champion in 1945. Born in Harlem, Pease graduated from Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn and Fordham University, and he and his wife, Louise, raised their daughter, Denise, in Corona. He went on to work as a senior instructor at RCA Institute, a microwave engineer at Tung-Sol Electronics, and for more than two decades, as an educator at Suffolk County Community College, where he was a professor of electrical engineering and assistant dean of instruction. He was the first full-time African American administrator at the college, and the first African American president of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. Pease gave back to his community in many ways, including sponsoring a scholarship awarded through the Central Brooklyn Martin Luther King Commission to student winners of essay and art contests. In the 1970s, Pease also served on the board of the Langston Hughes Branch of the Queens Public Library. Through his career, he received awards from the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, the New York University Weekend Tutorial Project, the Professional Achievement Award of the Brownsville Association for the Study of African American Life and History, the Teacher of the Year Award from the New York University Outreach Program for Mathematics and Science, the Mary McLeod Bethune Award for the motivation of black youth, and a proclamation from the Suffolk County Executive for outstanding service and leadership. His daughter, Denise Pease, a longtime government leader, went on to serve under President Obama as Regional Administrator for the U.S. General Services Administration Northeast and Caribbean Region, as well as on President Biden’s Advisory Commission on Advancing Educational Equity, Excellence, and Economic Opportunity for Black Americans. In honor of his dedicated community service, the intersection of 104th Street and 35th Avenue in North Corona is co-named Professor William H. Pease, Jr. Way.

Sister Mary Patrick McCarthy (1935–2002) was a nun, educator, and beloved member of the Jackson Heights community in Queens, New York. As a child, she attended Blessed Sacrament Church and School - the same institution where she would return decades later to serve as principal from 1967 to 2002. During her 35-year tenure, Sister Mary guided the school through significant transitions, advocating for the neighborhood’s growing Hispanic community throughout the 1970s and 1980s. She supported many recent immigrants from South America, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Cuba by ensuring access to quality, affordable education.

Police Officer Edward Byrne (1966-1988) was a rookie officer who was killed in the line of duty on February 26, 1988. Byrne was shot several times in the head and died instantly as he sat in his police car while on assignment protecting a drug case witness at 107th Avenue and Inwood Street in South Jamaica, Queens. The cold-blooded killing, which was apparently a plot to intimidate witnesses from testifying against drug dealers, shocked the consciousness of the city. A year after the murder, four men were convicted and sentenced to the maximum sentences of 25 years to life for the crime. Byrne was single, 22, and living in Massapequa, Long Island, at the time he was murdered. He had joined the police force the previous July, and worked at the 103rd Precinct in Jamaica, Queens.

Patrol Officer Phillip Cardillo (1941 - 1972) was an NYPD police officer assigned to the 28th Precinct in Harlem. On April 14, 1972, he and his partner, Patrol Officer Vito Narvarra, responded to what would later be determined to be a false call about an officer in distress. The officers arrived at the location, a Nation of Islam mosque in Harlem, and they entered to investigate. While inside, both officers were severely beaten. Cardillo was shot with his own gun, and he died six days later. A suspect was later arrested, but no conviction was obtained, and the case remains open to this day. Navarra went on to achieve the rank of first grade detective, completing 27 years of service in the NYPD before he retired in 1995. Born in New York City, Cardillo was the son of Frank J. and Helen E. Cardillo. His father worked as a platform man for a trucking company. In 1963, Cardillo married Claudia Reese, and the couple had three children. He joined the NYPD in 1967 and was partnered with Navarra a year later. On his death in 1972, Cardillo was survived by his wife and children. He is buried at Calvary Cemetery in Woodside. On October 19, 2015, a dedication ceremony was held to co-name the intersection of 28th Avenue and Ulmer Street, in front of the New York Police Academy in College Point, as Ptl. Phillip Cardillo Way. In 2025, the northeast corner of the same intersection was co-named for Navarra as Detective Vito Navarra Way, reuniting the fellow officers and partners at a place symbolic of their service.

Paul Ferrara (1969-2014) joined the New York City Police Department in June 1992, and began his career on patrol in the 81st Precinct located in Brooklyn. Immediately after the tragedy on September 11, 2001, he was assigned to Ground Zero for the recovery efforts and spent many weeks thereafter assisting with public safety. After serving the Bedford Stuyvesant /Stuyvesant Heights communities for 14 years, he was promoted to Sergeant in February 2006, and was subsequently assigned to the 110th Precinct. On his days off, he would often be assigned to the elite Patrol Borough Queens North Counterterrorism Unit. This unit is responsible for patrolling “sensitive locations” such as stadiums, malls and other terrorist target locations. During his career he was recognized twice for Excellent Police Duty. Ferrara died on August 28, 2014, as a result of 9/11-related illness.

John Lionel Golden (1874-1955) was a playwright who, at one time, had a Broadway theater named after him (202 W 58 Street). Golden and his wife opened their huge property in Bayside to the neighborhood for recreational activities. When they died, they donated the property to the city with the stipulation that it remain a park. The land is now Crocheron Park and a portion is designated as Golden Field. According to Wikipedia, as a songwriter, Golden was best-known as lyricist for "Poor Butterfly". He produced many Broadway shows and four films.

Detective Brian P. Simonsen (1976-2019) was a 19-year veteran of the NYPD who was tragically killed in the line of duty on February 12, 2019, while responding to an armed robbery. The corner of Jamaica Avenue and 118th Street, which leads to the 102nd Precinct where he served his entire NYPD career, has been named in his honor.

George Upton Harvey (1881-1946) was Queens Borough President from 1928 to 1941. Born in County Galway, Ireland, the Harveys moved to Chicago when George was five years old. His father founded The International Confectioner, a trade paper, and after working there Harvey served as a correspondent and photographer for the Army and Navy journal. A captain during World War I, he commanded Company A of the 308th Infantry Regiment, 77th Division. In 1920, Harvey was appointed Assistant Director of the State Income Tax Bureau in Jamaica, New York.  Harvey began his career in electoral politics when he successfully ran for election to the Board of Aldermen in 1921 as a Republican from Queens and was re-elected in 1923. Though Harvey lost the 1925 election for President of the Board of Aldermen, a sewer scandal resulting in the ouster of Borough President Maurice Connolly vaulted Harvey into the Borough Presidency in a special election to complete Connolly’s term. Harvey was Queens’ first Republican Borough President since the 1898 consolidation of New York City. He was re-elected to this office in 1929, 1933, and 1937, serving until 1941.  Harvey was a bitter foe of the Tammany political machine at home and Communism abroad. In 1928, he initiated a major expansion of arterial highway and parkway improvements in Queens. He also played an active role in the World’s Fair at Flushing Meadow in 1939-40. In 1932 and again in 1938, he considered running for Governor but ultimately declined to do so. On April 6, 1946, Harvey died of a heart attack while helping to battle a brush fire near his home in New Milford, Connecticut. The park also contains George U. Harvey Memorial Playground.

Malcolm X (1925-1965) was a civil rights activist and a prominent leader in the Black nationalist movement in the late 1950s and early 1960s. On February 21, 1965, while preparing to deliver a lecture at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights, he was assassinated when several gunmen rushed the stage and shot him at close range. Three members of the Nation of Islam were tried and sentenced for his murder, though two were later exonerated. The Autobiography of Malcolm X, written by Malcolm X in collaboration with author Alex Haley and published posthumously, is considered a classic of American autobiographical literature. Born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska, he was the fourth of seven children of Reverend Earl Little, who worked as a local president and organizer for the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), a Black nationalist group led by Marcus Garvey, and Louise (Norton) Little, a Grenadine-born American who worked as division secretary for the UNIA. His father’s work led to death threats from the Ku Klux Klan, forcing the family to relocate several times, and they eventually settled in East Lansing, Michigan. When Malcolm was six years old, his father died in what was officially ruled a streetcar accident, though he was possibly the victim of white supremacists. In 1939, his mother was committed to a mental institution. After living in foster homes for a period, Malcolm eventually moved to Boston. In 1946, he was arrested on charges of larceny and served time in prison, where he converted to the Nation of Islam and changed his name to Malcolm X. After his release in 1952, he began working with the movement’s leader, Elijah Mohammad, to expand membership nationwide. In 1958, Malcolm married Betty Sanders, and together the couple had six daughters. In 1964, Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam following disagreements with the leadership. He traveled widely in North Africa and the Middle East and underwent a second conversion to traditional Islam, changing his name to El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. In 1965, he established the Organization of Afro-American Unity as a secular platform to unify Black Americans with the people of Africa and to build solidarity with the developing world by shifting the focus from civil rights to human rights. The Malcolm X Garden is located in North Corona at 33-02 112th Street and 111-26 Northern Boulevard. In addition to the Garden, Malcolm X Place in East Elmhurst is also named in his honor.

My husband, Joseph Imparato, better known in Long Island City as Joe Imp, was a native of LIC, and he set an example for everyone to follow. He helped the elderly, whether it was bringing them shopping, taking them to the doctors or shoveling snow. He did this for them on his day off. His life was dedicated to helping his community. He opened his restaurant on Jackson Avenue, Joe Imp's, which introduced many people to the area. Saint Mary’s Church was an extremely important part of Joe’s life. His dedication to the people in his community was evident by his dedication to the church. If there were those who couldn’t afford a tree for Christmas and he found out about it, he would buy a tree for them and decorate it, put presents under the tree and would never take credit for doing it. Joe wasn’t only a gem to me, he was a LIC gem. That’s why my husband Joe deserved the honor of having a street named after him.

Rep. Benjamin S. Rosenthal (D-NY) represented northeast Queens in the U.S. Congress from 1962 until his death in January 1983. Born in Manhattan, Rosenthal attended New York City public schools, Long Island University and City College before serving in the U.S. Army during WWII. He received his law degree from Brooklyn Law School and was admitted to the bar in 1949. In 1962, Rosenthal won a special election to the Eighty-Seventh Congress to fill the vacancy caused when Rep. Lester Holtzman won a seat on the state Supreme Court; Rosenthal was then reelected to the 11 succeeding Congresses. During his congressional tenure, Rosenthal was an early opponent of the Vietnam War and a champion of consumer protection causes. He was a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee and chairman of the Subcommittee for Commerce, Consumer, and Monetary Affairs.

Louis Armstrong (1901-1971) is widely regarded as one of the most innovative and influential figures in jazz, known for both his trumpet improvisations and his distinctive singing voice. He also broke down numerous racial divides in the music and entertainment worlds, becoming the first Black performer to get featured billing in a major Hollywood film ("Pennies From Heaven," 1936) and the first Black host of a national radio show (Fleischmann's Yeast Show, 1937). Born in New Orleans in 1901, Armstrong grew up impoverished in a racially segregated city. He dropped out of school in fifth grade to work, and developed a close relationship with a local Jewish family that gave him odd jobs and nurtured his love of music. By the age of 11, Armstrong wound up in the Colored Waif’s Home for Boys, where he joined the band and studied the cornet in earnest. Upon his release from the home in 1914, he began working as a musician on Mississippi riverboats and other local venues. His reputation skyrocketed, and by the early 1920s he moved north, performing and recording with jazz bands in Chicago and New York. Throughout the 1920s and '30s, Armstrong made dozens of records with his own and many other ensembles, toured extensively, and began performing in Broadway productions and movies. After some business and health setbacks, and in response to changing musical tastes, Armstrong scaled his group down to a six-piece combo in the 1940s and resumed touring internationally, recording albums and appearing in movies. Some of his biggest popular hits came in the later years of his career, including "Hello Dolly" (1964) and "What A Wonderful World" (1967). His grueling schedule took its toll on his heart and kidneys and in 1968 he was forced to take time off to recuperate, but he began performing again in 1970. Armstrong died in his sleep in July 1971, just a few months after his final engagement at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York. Armstrong and his fourth wife, Lucille Wilson, purchased their home in Corona in 1943, shortly after they were married, and lived there for the remainder of their lives. I.S. 227, a public middle school serving grades 5 through 8, is located approximately one mile from their home, which is now the Louis Armstrong House Museum, offering public tours, concerts and educational programs.

The Persia Campbell Dome, August 2022. The dome houses a lecture space for the Queens College community.

Patrick Deignan (1946-1983) was a civic and community leader in his neighborhood of Jackson Heights. He co-founded the Jackson Heights Civic Association and was founder and board chairman of the Catherine M. Sheridan Center for Senior Citizens (now the Catherine Sheridan Older Adult Center). He was also active in various charitable, fraternal, and church organizations. In 1971, he became a member of Community Board 3, serving as its chairman from 1973 to 1975. He was a Democratic District leader in Jackson Heights from 1974 to 1982, chairing the Borough President's Commission on Charter Revision and also serving on the executive committee of the Queens Democratic Party. Deignan was born on Staten Island on March 17, 1946, and raised in Jackson Heights, where he attended Blessed Sacrament School. He later continued his studies at Manhattan College (now Manhattan University) in Riverdale. He died on October 6, 1983, at Lenox Hill Hospital after a brief gastrointestinal illness. Survived at the time by his wife, the former Joy Laskowski, and a son, Patrick Jr., he is buried at St. Charles Cemetery in Farmingdale, New York. On November 5, 1997, a ceremony was held at 34th Avenue and 69th Street, at the western end of a 26-block-long mall in Jackson Heights (also known as Paseo Park), to co-name the stretch of traffic islands in Deignan’s honor as Patrick C. Deignan Mall.

Fiorello H. LaGuardia (1882–1947) was born in New York City to immigrant parents, attended public schools and graduated from New York University Law School in 1910. After practicing law for several years, he was elected as the nation’s first Italian American member of Congress in 1916. He served as a U.S. Representative until 1919, when he resigned to join the Army Air Service and serve in World War I. Upon his return, he was president of the New York City Board of Aldermen in 1920 and 1921, and was re-elected to Congress from 1923 to 1933. LaGuardia then served as mayor of New York City from 1934 to 1945. Among LaGuardia's many achievements as mayor, he is credited with unifying and modernizing New York City's public transit system, consolidating much of the city government, cracking down on illegal gambling, and beginning transportation projects that created many of the city’s bridges, tunnels, parkways and airports. He was also instrumental in the establishment of Queens College. In September 1937, Mayor LaGuardia broke ground on this airport's site. Its construction was funded through a $45 million Federal Works Progress Administration grant. More than half of the 558 acres on which the airport was built was man-made, filled in with more than 17 million cubic yards of cinders, ashes and trash. The new airport opened in 1939 as New York City Municipal Airport. In August 1940, the Board of Estimates renamed the facility for LaGuardia, who considered the project one of his greatest achievements. Today it is the third largest airport in the New York metropolitan area.

Kalpana Chawla (1962 – 2003), was an Indian-born American astronaut and mechanical engineer who became the first Indian-born woman to go to space in 1997 on the Space Columbia Shuttle. She died on her second flight when the Space Shuttle Columbia broke up on re-entry into Earth's atmosphere in 2003. Chawla was born on August 1, 1961 in Karnal, India. She graduated from Tangore School, India, and went on to earn a Bachelor of Science degree from Punjab Engineering College, a Master of Science degree in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Texas, and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Colorado. Chawla began her career at NASA Ames Research Center in 1988. In December 1995, she was selected by NASA to be an astronaut candidate in the 15th Group of Astronauts. Her first flight was in November 1997. For her second Space Shuttle flight, she joined six other members of the crew on a 16-day flight on the Colombia Space Shuttle that departed Earth on January 17, 2003. Tragically, on February 1, 2003, 16 minutes before the scheduled landing, she and her crew perished. Kalpana Chawla remains the first person from India to go into space and a National hero.

The following text was written by Paul Russo's brother George: Paul was a humble and devout Christian young man. Passing at the age of 33, his life was short but meaningful. He was a person of integrity who devoted his later life to the ministry of the less fortunate. Tending to the homeless, building shelter for the poor in Third World countries and bringing the spiritually disenfranchised to the Lord became his mission. He was also entrepreneurial and business-savvy, always giving back to others whatever success he earned through his hard work. The last months of his life were an inspiration to those who witnessed the selfless acceptance of his medical diagnosis offered for the healing of others. Paul was a heroic saint to those who knew him best.

Christopher Racaniello (b. 1971) a Little Neck native, worked for Cantor Fitzegerald at the World Trade Center. He was killed in the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001.

Karol Rathaus (1895-1954) was a distinguished composer of orchestral and chamber music in addition to operas and film scores. Considered a child prodigy, he began writing music at age 7 and by 14 was composing for full orchestra. Rathaus was born to a Jewish family in Tarnopol, Austria, a town now part of Ukraine. After serving in the Austrian Army during World War I, he resumed his studies with Austrian composer Franz Schreker, first in Vienna and then in Berlin, where he settled and launched his professional career. By 1934, Rathaus had achieved considerable success with his varied compositions, including the score for the now-classic film, The Brothers Karamazov (1931). However, fearing the rise of Nazism and anti-Semitic violence, Rathaus fled Berlin in 1932, spending several years in Paris and then London, and continuing to compose. When he emigrated to the United States in 1938, he left behind a number of unpublished manuscripts that were destroyed in the London Blitz. Rathaus lived for a short time in Hollywood, to be near the film industry, but ultimately settled in New York in 1940. For the last 14 years of his life, Rathaus was professor of composition at Queens College, CUNY. In addition to teaching, he received numerous commissions and wrote works for the New York Philharmonic, the St. Louis Symphony and the Metropolitan Opera. He died in 1954 at the age of 59, succumbing to recurring illness and fatigue. His papers, including many music manuscripts, are housed in Queens College’s Department of Special Collections and Archives.

William Hallett (1616 – 1706), an early English colonizer in America, was born in 1616 in Dorsetshire, England. Hallett's arrival in America is not definitively documented, but by 1647 in Connecticut, he married his second wife, Elizabeth Fones Winthrop Feake Hallett. Elizabeth was the niece of John Winthrop, the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Her first husband died by drowning, and she divorced her second husband due to mental illness. When Elizabeth married William while pregnant with their first child, it caused a scandal in the Puritan colony. The Puritan church didn't recognize mental illness as grounds for divorce, and the townspeople of Connecticut, upon learning they were considered "living in sin," demanded Elizabeth be hanged. John Winthrop Jr., Elizabeth's uncle and the governor of Connecticut, intervened. He struck a deal with Peter Stuyvesant, allowing the Halletts to flee to New Amsterdam. Under the cover of darkness, Elizabeth left behind all her property, and they sailed to Hell Gate in Newtown, present-day Hallets Cove. Stuyvesant appointed Hallett Sheriff of Flushing around 1650. However, he later imprisoned Hallett for hosting an Episcopalian minister. Hallett was eventually forgiven. In 1652, William Hallett purchased 160 acres of land, which became known as Hallett's Cove. Twelve years later, his holdings expanded to include all of present-day Astoria, encompassing roughly 2,200 acres. The area remained largely rural and used as a ship landing until 1839 when fur merchant Stephen A. Halsey officially founded Hallets Cove. A steamboat and ferry line were then established, connecting the area to 86th Street in Manhattan. The original farmhouse at Hallett's Cove was burned down by indigenous people, forcing the Hallett family to flee to Flushing. Despite this setback, they persevered and built a life in the new world, becoming part of early American history. Elizabeth's actions in Connecticut helped establish women's property rights, while William's banishment and reinstatement played a role in setting the stage for future protests like the Flushing Remonstrance. The couple eventually left the Anglican church and converted to Quakerism. William Hallett died in April 1706 in the area now known as Hallets Cove in Newtown, Queens, New York Colony, British Colonial America. A fictionalized account of their marriage appears in the book The Winthrop Woman by Anya Seton.

Officer Robert J. Rogerson (1920-1975), a 29-year veteran of the NYPD who worked as an inspector in the License Division at the 114th Precinct in Astoria, was struck by a car, ultimately succumbing to his injuries. On June 24, 1974, he was at the station, standing in the middle of 35th Street near Astoria Boulevard to direct a cab driver into a driveway for the car's inspection. The cab went out of control, hitting Rogerson and dragging him 20 feet, striking and pinning him against a utility pole. The crash left Rogerson with a fractured skull, two broken legs, and internal injuries. He was taken to Elmhurst Hospital in critical condition. Several of his fellow officers donated blood to assist with his internal hemorrhaging. Left in a coma, Rogerson tragically never recovered, and he passed away from his injuries on March 3, 1975. He was survived by his wife and two children, whom he lived with in Ridgewood, Queens, close to where this street was co-named in his honor. Inspection of the cab revealed no mechanical defects. The cab driver told police his foot had slipped from the brake pedal to the accelerator. He was given a summons for speeding.

Mollie A. Gustine (1930?-2020) was a pioneer of the NYPD and one of the first Black female detectives on the New York City Police force. She joined the force in 1963 in what was then the Police Women’s Division. In 1974, she was promoted to detective and was one of the first three women to join the Queens Sex Crimes Unit, where she often worked undercover. She served as an officer for 20 years, and she was also among the first women on the force to serve as a union delegate for the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association and the first Black female delegate to the Detectives' Endowment Association. Gustine was working for the Federal Reserve in the early 1960s when her cousin suggested she join the police force. She made the transition, and over the course of her career, taught ethical awareness to police department personnel. She also lectured on rape, sexual abuse, and personal safety to a variety of women’s groups and often represented her department in media efforts to warn the public about scams and con games which she understood firsthand from her undercover work. On February 26, 1982, Gustine was shot in the chest and arm during an attempted robbery as she was returning to her home in Queens after a late-night tour of duty. She fired back and was able to help stop her attackers. Three men were arrested for the crime. However, the shooting led to her retirement in 1983. In 2023, she was posthumously awarded the Police Combat Cross, the department’s second-highest honor, for engaging an armed adversary under imminent threat to life. After leaving the force, Gustine worked with the homeless and Christian fellowship through various church affiliations. A pianist who played by ear, she loved music and also enjoyed watching classic films on television. On April 3, 2020, she died of COVID-19 at the age of 90. The corner of 192nd Street and 117th Road in St. Albans was co-named in her honor on August 20, 2022, as Detective Mollie A. Gustine Way.

Ivan Mrakovcic (1963-2020) was an architect, historian, environmentalist and preservationist whose contributions enhanced the Richmond Hill neighborhood. His civic involvement earned him many leadership positions and stewardships and resulted in the establishment of the Historic District in North Richmond Hill on the New York State and National Historic registers in March 2019. He was the founder and president of the Richmond Hill Historical Society, served as treasurer of the Forest Park Trust and was a member of Queens Community Board 9 for 15 years, of which he served as chairperson from 2002 until 2007. He was a founding board member of the Friends of QueensWay park advocacy group and was also a Greenway Committee Member.