First of all, Forgotten NY is is one of the best websites around. Period.

Here's a link to their take on Canarsie: http://forgotten-ny.com/2008/07/canarsie-brooklyn-part-1/

And here's the pic they lead with. It's the old Armondo's storefront, right next to the Rockaway Parkway Station. It's still there, but those vintage Coca Cola signs (that once adorned every "by-the-slice" pizza joint in the City back then, are long gone). I remember it well, though.

I know you can't have your wife down Florida with her jugs hanging out PB!

Anyone have info on the democrat club in canarsie I think it was called? Remember readin a ny mag article written by Pileggi in the 80s and he talked about how all kinds of mobsters, politicians and city officials hung out there and lots of back room deals were negotiated there.

Anyone have any stories about this place, wiseguys that hung out there, who ran it etc? Is it still open? Thanks fellas

Im not sure but that's the place gaspipe used to hang around in his early days, or that was the 19th hole might be mistaken.

Great pizza at Armando's and great heroes at Sonny's.Was there in '08,Canarsie.One of my uncles wifes is from Canarsie,and the one of 3 times i talked to her she told me how she loved the place growing up,and ave L ,etc.
Don't know if you remmember PB,but when i first signed on here we talked about Canarsie and the mob over there.My granddad who grew up close by said for exp that flatlands was a middle class neighbourhood,a lot of well off Jews and little Italians around ave N.Canarsie too.He always said that there were a lot of chop shops,car related repair shops along ave D,foster and so on.do you feel tha same way?You are a lucky guy sittig in In sunny Florida,i envi you very much..


Also TB,don't know when you left BK,but do you remmember a gang from New Lots Ave called New Lots boys?Read a book by Richard Q called Surviving East NY.Not a bad book lot of neighbourhood stories,he mentions a lot of mibsters from that part of town.

Yes. The New Lots Boys hung around "The Triangle," which was a wedge-shaped block where New Lots Avenue met Livonia Avenue, between Cleveland Street and Ashford Street, under the elevated subway tracks of the New Lots Avenue station of the IRT. That station was the last stop on that subway line. The tracks continued to Elton Street, where they curved and went up the street to the "car barns" (repair/maintenance shops) between Hegeman Avenue and Linden Boulevard. I know all this because my first home was a top floor apartment in a building on Elton Street and New Lots Avenue. Those tracks ran 20 feet from our living room window. Made a hell of a racket.

And as he put it there somewhere on elton street was a park where they hung out,new lots junior crew.Suposedly that was a gang that had its start in 1942,now thats real early.I think i know what building you are refering to.What year did you leave Brooklyn TB?

Just watched that video from NYE on DIEHIPSTER.COM.

All I can say is smh...

I can't stand these motherfuckers either. Make me sick.

Mikey, would you be referring to the Jefferson Club at 77 Conklin Ave in Canarsie? That club is still there I think you can view it if you look at Google maps. It was the HQ for the Democratic leader for Brooklyn, Meade Esposito for quite a while. Apparently there were allegations of bribery, corruption, political backroom dealings, etc. made but no allegations to mob ties that I could see.

Maybe the club in the Pileggi article you read was referring to the Mangano Democrat Club, mentioned in Phillip Carlo's book Gaspipe, near Gaspipe's house on Union Street in Park Slope? According to the book it was a scene for meetings and backroom dealings between Union officials, businessmen and politicians etc. so safe to say the mob wouldn't have been very far away from any deals being made.

Here it gets a bit confusing though and maybe off topic from your original post, sorry. I found reference to a City Democratic Club in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle newspaper from October 22nd 1937. There is a V.Mangano mentioned in an article on page 7 so I assumed this is the same City Democratic Club which Vincent Mangano established in the 1930s. But this club was located at 367 Clinton Street which is obviously not a few doors up the road from Gaspipe's house.

The link to the article I found is here under the heading "City Club to Fete Democratic Slate"

http://bklyn.newspapers.com/newspage/52823463/

..it's interesting even if off topic from your original question! This all started because I was trying to figure out what was the address of the Mangano Club on Union St mentioned in Carlo's book...and despite all this research I failed, so I gave up in the end. haha..

Alexandarns, here is a photo of my father and me in that Elton Street park taken centuries ago.

http://prntscr.com/5smme4

wow TB,thats a great pic.Your father looks like a real mans man.Was he like a boxer or something?this is '40 or '41 right?
Great pic TB,thanks for sharing.

My father wasn't a boxer, but he grew up in the era before TV, so that left him with a lot of time for working out.

I decline to answer the question of when the photo was taken on the grounds that my answer might tend to age me.

Yes you can tell he worked out,sorry didn't mean to age you..

Made my day. Maybe even my year. But it's only January, so don't get a swelled head .

OK, guys, just to keep this thread going:

Here is a photo of the "Triangle" in East New York, Brooklyn, former hangout of the New Lots Boys gang, taken in 1997. Photo was taken from Livonia Avenue (New Lots Avenue on left), looking westward from Cleveland Street. Note the stairs leading to the New Lots Avenue station of the IRT--last stop (or first stop) on the New Lots Line. As kids, we'd wait on those stairs until a bell sounded, signaling 30 seconds until the train left the station. Then we'd dash up the stairs and duck under the turnstile--just enough time to get on the train before the cashier left his booth to chase us:
http://prntscr.com/5tgzzr

Hooligan .

And, while I'm on a roll here:

The storefront below the "Mini-Mart" sign is the site of the legendary Midnight Rose's candy store, home of Murder Inc. until 1941 (photo taken in 1997), on Saratoga Avenue near Livonia Avenue in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn. I worked in this store when I was in high school, though I didn't know it had been the hangout of Abe (Kid Twist) Reles, Allie (Tick Tock) Tannenbaum, Pittsburg Phil Strauss, Happy Maione, and other legendary gangsters, years earlier.
http://prntscr.com/5th4pa

Is Canarsie the neighborhood that Andrew DeDinado came from?

I dont know how in the world Reynolds would of been made. He was a drug user and I'm not so sure he was an earner. A lot of these guys were thugs, doing high risk strong arm shit that usually results in a very short lived career. Most were basically used by guys like Spero who i dont believe ever had any intention of making any( most) of those guys. A guy like Patera who was a maniac was methodical and made a lot of money. He was also disciplined unlike Reynolds and Calco. Sure Reynolds stood up but still, is he the guy you could rely on????
Most of those guys come across as being unstable and too interested in impressing and making a name for themselves. Most guys get made by being earners and are noticed that way. casso is a good example.

Great pic TB,thats the spot where New Lots boys hung out.That book mentiones that spot a lot.Great pictures TB,Midnight rosse pic too.

Excellent picture. Thanks for posting.

I bet the current neighborhood inhabitants are completely unaware of what went on in the 2nd floor of that building. 70 or so hits (I think).

And... speaking of Canarsie--

http://www.wsj.com/articles/canarsie-hedge-fund-collapses-1421964384?.tsrc=rimsp

also, Pizzaboy, I've not been on recently but no disrespect intended re: Jamaicans v. Haitians, etc. You're one of the folks here who obviously know the city well and we can have an excellent time just talking about that so apologies if it seemed I jumped on that, it was just enthusiasm. (Some of those Haitian women are very hot btw.)

Forgotten New York is very good at what it does, yes. The main guy there is more interested in streets and buildings and light posts than history and people per se but that's more observation than criticism; one man can't do everything.

Also, I don't know if it's mentioned before but do you know the excellent low-budget 1961 movie "Blast Of Silence", writte, directed and starring Allan Baron (he later become a prolific tv director) of New Lots Ave and I'm gonna say Logan. I believe growing up where and when he did, Baron "knew" some people, if not intimately, then simply as matter of course.

For those who've not seen it I won't give away ending but I will say there's a GREAT scene at I think the end of Fountain Ave when it still had some fishing shack similar to what you'd see in Broad Channel today; you can see the Belt Parkway throug the mist in background.

p/s-- can't believe I forgot this...

Carl Kruger, who lived in Mill Basin but represented Canarsie...

and not just any old Mill Basic shack but... fucking Casso's former house...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/11/nyregion/11kruger.html?pagewanted=all

the one he killed that architect, Anthony Fava.

Here's Tom Robbins, 20+ years before he co-wrote the D'Arco book with Capeci (which I do value for its Brooklyn lore tho' Al's opinion on mob is obviously very subjective & almost certainly shaded to his benefit)--

http://articles.philly.com/1992-07-20/news/26027522_1_casso-dream-house-luchese