Monday, February 19, 2007

Newspaper declares St. Saviour's on last leg


Sorry, this one wasn't linked online.

48 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's obvious the reporter didn't do their basic homework regarding the accuracy of which settlement came first. Records prove it was Maspeth before Flushing.

That's why these weekly newspapers really ought to be called "weaklies". They also seem to have editorializing confused with non biased reporting.

Shame on you Mr. Editor. You should take the "reporter" to the wood shed or , perhaps, a refresher class in journalism is advisable!

Anonymous said...

Who is this reporter to say that a community group is "grasping at straws" by trying to save a piece of their history?

Anonymous said...

Does this surprise anyone? The Tribune is run by Gary Ackerman, part of the Dem machine. The Dem machine wants this property destroyed and built upon with ugly houses so their pockets will be lined by developer money. Please - you have Evan Stavisky lobbying to have it torn down. There you go.

Anonymous said...

So much for unbiased reporting.

Anonymous said...

The Queens Tribiune - keeps your pet bird entertained all day long!

Anonymous said...

Does anyone think that after this developer gets his zoning change via Dennis Gallagher that he is going to build around the church? Or is it more likely that a fire will "accidentally" be started in the middle of the night?

Anonymous said...

Why didn't Gallagher start raising money from the city last year? He could have had enough money to buy it by now for the community.

Anonymous said...

Didn't Gallagher and Katz come up with $3 million to buy the Keyspan site when it was for sale? Where did that money go? It could have been put towards the purchase of St. Saviour's.

Anonymous said...

Real estate ads and politician ads are what keep the Tribune and the rest of these so-called newspapers running. Therefore, don't expect any accurate or unbiased coverage of a landmarking fight. It would be in the Tribune's best interest if the site was bulldozed.

Anonymous said...

1645 is what I remember painting on a sign in downtown Flushing (to cover up an old defunct Downtown Flushing Development Co. logo). Maspeth is older. I think that 1645 was the date of Flushing's incorporation. Logically speaking, Maspeth is closer to the East River and would have been settled first. Flushing is further away. Make sense?

And Lisa De Bourbon at LPC is tap dancing her way out of any responsibility. What the hell is the difference for what purpose the archaeological study was done ? It's the damn results that count! These people make me sick!!!!!

georgetheatheist said...

Don't forget the 2 pages of classified ads from whores!

Anonymous said...

I challenge the Queens Tribune to varify with primary source documents:

1. Queens is named for Queen Catherine.

2. John Bowne was involved with the Flushing Remonstrance

3. The soure that 'Flushing' (not the odd hamlet) was settled in 1620s.

Anonymous said...

This article is a piece of fiction, and furthermore a piece of shit. Lack of research, obvious bias. I wrote better stuff for my middle school newspaper. What high school drop out edits this fecal creation?

Now excuse me while I go take a huge crap (I had a big breakfast) and wipe my ass with the pages of the Tribune.

Anonymous said...

"Gallagher acknowledged the site's archaeological potential and historical significance, but said he didn't think the findings would make a difference."

That's a pretty defeatist attitude, Dennis. Why aren't you jumping on these findings and rubbing Tierney's nose in it? Oh, that's right, because you are in bed with the developer!

Anonymous said...

"If he can get the funds to purchase even part of this site, I will support the plan. Until then, the developer will hold off construction."

Gallagher seems to be saying that construction is being held off to give someone time to raise enough money to buy the property. Which begs the question, "Why isn't Gallagher lobbying for money from the city to buy the property?"

Anonymous said...

Weren't two beautiful photos of the historic church sent out with the press release about the archaeological findings? Yet this paper chose to use a photo which shows the church as it looked last summer with weeds growing around it. The photos sent out with the release (and posted here) support the architectural significance of the site, but were conveniently left out of the Tribune article. This piece was obviously slanted to make Gallagher look like a hero. Disgusting.

Anonymous said...

Check this out:

2006 Hidden Treasures of Queens

This is how the Trib has treated St. Saviour's in the past. It's listed as "Our Saviour" in the sidebar and the building is called a "dilapidated relic." The attitude of the paper towards this story is clear.

Anonymous said...

This came from the editor of the story to explain why it was so slanted:

"When a story has been told, told, and told once again, all to the same result, perspective develops, and comes through in the story."

The Queens Tribune, to my knowledge, has never done an article about St. Saviour's, except for the "2006 Treasures of Queens" which was basically a rehash of my FNY story, so I don't know what he's talking about.

Anonymous said...

The Queens Tribune covers Maspeth?

Anonymous said...

George, do you mean this?

QConf

Anonymous said...

What kind of misogynistic "newspaper" prints women's measurements? Crapper, please write about this!

Anonymous said...

I've been reading the Tribune online for years, but never saw this section before. It is APALLING to see women treated like pieces of meat in a butcher case. My daughter just turned 18 and I can't imagine how the parents of these girls would feel to see them paraded like prostitutes in a 'community newspaper'. Furthermore, I fear for the safety of these girls with their pictues and measurements posted online

I will never read the Tribune again and I urge anyone with a shred of decency to do the same. I will not buy from anyone who advertises in the Tribune!!!

Anonymous said...

Lay off the Tribune, the Q Conf is my favorite feature.

Anonymous said...

Hey Mike D,

Don't use the paper to wipe yourself. Your butt will turn yellow from the type of journalism practiced by the Tribune.

Anonymous said...

Have any other civic organizations ever been written about in this manner by the Tribune, or is JPCA being singled out because they have gone after Pinky? It seems to me that the paper's ties to county politicians are causing it to report stories in a way that make them look good to the detriment of neighborhood volunteer groups. This is very sad.

Anonymous said...

The Queens Tribune has gone down the tubes. The reporting with a few exceptions is amateurish, the editorials are dumb and who really pays attention to that rag anyway? Like the Courier, they are in the pockets of pols, developers and the real estate lobby. The article is just another hatchet job that the Trib is noted for.

Anonymous said...

Why would the developer be in a hurry to tear the church down if he hasn't gotten a zoning change yet? Why sink more money into a property when there's no guarantee that he'll get what he wants? Why is Gallagher helping the developer instead of making sure he doesn't get a zoning change? Certainly as a councilman he has the power to get to people in the govt who oversee this type of thing. Why isn't the Trib posing these tough questions to him instead of nitpicking with a civic group over how old Maspeth is?

Anonymous said...

Once again the Trib proves why it has become the laughingstock of Queens journalism. And here I thought the honor would go to the Times Ledger.

Anonymous said...

the queens tribune is a piece of crap, the writing is crap, the photos are crap

it's no wonder they can't hold on to any decent writer

that qconf is the most sexist piece of crap too.

everyone should stop writing about them and buy the new york times and let the trib keep giving away their kitty box liners

georgetheatheist said...

Re the TRIBUNE:
1.Why does Mike Schenkler feel the readers have to see him shaking hands on the ed. page with every politico in creation?
2.Why does former Parks Commissioner RACIST Henry Stern get an editorial say every week?
3.How come Leroy Comrie is in EVERY picture of the Tribune's sister publication, the SE Press?
4.How much $ does the Trib haul in every week from the organized crime whores' classified ads. (PS Victoria Schneps at the Courier was the only one who called the Trib on this is an editorial about 3 years ago.)

Anonymous said...

IF THE QUEENS TRIBUNE IS SO BAD THEN WHY ARE THERE SO MANY ARTICLES POSTED ON THIS SITE ABOUT THEM? DON'T GET ME WRONG, I'M NOT A BIG FAN OF THAT PAPER. IT'S OK TO READ WHILE YOU'RE IN LINE AT THE BANK BUT I WOULDN'T TAKE IT HOME.

Anonymous said...

George the Atheist, are you doing anything this Friday? $50 for 30 minutes.

I got my gig through the Queens Tribune.

Anonymous said...

DON'T BUY THE FRIGGIN' NY TIMES! You'll only encourage them. The construction is continuing on the expansion of the College Point plant even though DOB records indicate that only the foundation is approved. Weird, huh? Also, it seems as if the correspondences sent by CB#7 and other elected officials are being ignored. I am looking forward to the meeting between the parties on Thursday. By the way, City Councilman John Liu and State Senator Toby Stavisky have not, to the best of my knowledge, come forward to protect their constituency. Does anyone know what their position is on this matter?

However, when it comes to the local print media, we're all screwed! The letter that appeared here in Queens Crap was also sent to the Queens Tribune, Queens Chronicle, Queens Courier, and the Times Ledger papers. It was ignored. However, the Courier printed a one-sided, inaccurate story. Go figure! Kudos to the Queens Examiner for its front page story and for printing my letter. Honorable mention goes to the Queens Gazette for publishing my letter. I now consider Queens Crap a great source of Queens news...that you can't get anywhere else!

Anonymous said...

Oops! I forgot to add...
Save St. Saviour's!!! I cannot stress enough that once it's gone, it's gone!

Anonymous said...

What do you expect...... wasn't Mike Schenkler tight with Donald Manes' along with Ackerman? Are their Their faces likely to be clean?

Michael Nussbaum (from the Manes Parking Violations Bureau scandal days) I believe, is still connected to the Q. Trib.

I've dealt with them for over 23 years on key community issues and found them to be innept at basic newsgathering! If you don't keep on repeatedly going over and over the facts with them and even after you give them evidence pertaining to the story, they habitually get it all wrong.

I think that you've got to have ADD (attention defecit disorder) to work at the Trib!

It's funny though, how the Staviskys, Liu and developer friends manage to get clear coverage, while us community folks get their usual fuzzy logic brand of reporting!

H-m-m-m-m! Isn't "Multi-Meadia" still their subsidiary? Maybe they help Stavisky & Co. frame their articles!

Anonymous said...

1. The Tribune, in discussing history, has a distressing tendency to repeat ‘old wives tales,’ and not only refuses to use primary source documents, but ignores them when fact conflicts with political agendas.

Perhaps the most galling case of this politics trumping reality (and spawnnig bad history) is their tiresome insistence that Queen Catherine is the ‘namesake’ of Queens (although they are abundantly aware at this point, like everyone else, of the overwhelming evidence it is not). They compound this distressing tendency by giving credence to historical fictions like Arbitration Rock or repeating the inexcusable error that the Quakers wrote the Flushing Remonstrance (or that John Bowne had a hand in its creation). The area in red is a complete fabrication and we challenge the Tribune to either give evidence to support this, or publish a public retraction:

Religion

The story of Queens religion begins in 1657, when New Amsterdam Governor Peter Stuyvesant mandated that his Dutch Reform religion be the only one practiced in the area. A group of Quakers in the Town of Flushing known as the Society of Friends rose in opposition, which angered Stuyvesant, and led him to issue an order forbidding anyone in Flushing from admitting Quakers into their homes for any reason.
John Bowne, an Englishman who was sympathetic to the plight of the Society of Friends, welcomed the Quakers into his Flushing house, where Sunday services were held in his kitchen. As disdain grew for Stuyvesant’s strict religious policies, residents saw the need for action, and in 1657, drafted the Flushing Remonstrance

2.The date of 1645 is the established settlement of Flushing. Vincent Seyfried in the ‘Encyclopedia of New York’ (pg 419) states Flushing was established on that date, as does Jeff Kroessler's ‘Timeline of New York’ (which makes no mention of that earlier date), as does Thompson’s ‘History of Long Island’ (1830s) and Waller’s ‘History of Flushing’ (1890s). I personally recall observances of Flushing’s 350th Anniversary in 1995.

Even the Tribune gets into the act with 1645:
Queens Stone Age

3. Remember, New Amsterdam did not have an permanent settlers until 1623! We have to ask the Tribune as to its, yes, primary source documentation on their information that Flushing was an established community in 1628.

The records do state that there were hints of an earlier possible settlement from the established 1645 date, perhaps a temporary trading post, and there very well may be the odd farm or two (I think the folks at Alley and perhaps Bayside claim they had the scattered farms at an earlier date.)

However, they must have not been very significant. The Manatus Maps, first survey of Manhattan and metropolitan area (dated 1639) shows settlements at such far flung areas as Dutch Kills, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Pavonia (NJ) and Staten Island. The Flushing region has nothing. (Source: I.M. Phelphs Stokes “Iconography of Manhattan”)

Anonymous said...

I think the Tribune hires its editorial staff straight from the McDonald's on Borden Ave that can never get my order right.

Probably the same place Gallagher finds his dim-bulb cronies.

georgetheatheist said...

Trixie, It's a deal,,,I'll meet you behind the Fat Boy on QBlvd....but be quiet, we don't want to wake up Helen Marshall.

Anonymous said...

This is what you do. Get a bunch of kids from Maspeth, picket Gary Ackerman's office and say he is anti-kid and anti-community.

Call NY 1.

Lets have some fum.

Anonymous said...

Deos anyone want to look up Ackerman's voting record in congress and take a look at

any pro votes for preservation?

and pro votes wasting taxpayers money?

Anonymous said...

editing error, i said this was in red, but not displayed. maybe brackets:

[A group of Quakers in the Town of Flushing known as the Society of Friends rose in opposition, which angered Stuyvesant, and led him to issue an order forbidding anyone in Flushing from admitting Quakers into their homes for any reason. John Bowne, an Englishman who was sympathetic to the plight of the Society of Friends, welcomed the Quakers into his Flushing house, where Sunday services were held in his kitchen. As disdain grew for Stuyvesant’s strict religious policies, residents saw the need for action, and in 1657, drafted the Flushing Remonstrance.]

Anonymous said...

"and pro votes wasting taxpayers money? "

Nah, never. I can't imagine a NYC politician wasting my tax dollars. Inconceivable.

Anonymous said...

From the Queens Library Web site (for as much as you want to trust that bunch of liars and thieves):

The earliest known inhabitants of Flushing were the Matinecock Indians, one of thirteen tribes on Long Island. The first Europeans to settle Flushing were the Dutch, who arrived in 1628, when Flushing was part of New Netherlands. The Dutch governor, William Kieft, purchased all the land which would later become Queens County from the Native Americans in 1639, and on October 10, 1645, the town of Flushing itself was founded. Originally named Vlissingen, after the seaport in the Netherlands, it was later anglicized to Flushing when the English took over the colony.

Anonymous said...

Let's pass the hat and raise some money to buy an 1/8 or 1/4 page ad in the Q. Trib. The ad might read,

"I WOULDN'T
LET MY DOG
PEE ON YOUR PAPER!"

Let's see if they would run it!

Anonymous said...

Not for nothing, but the guy who runs the Queens Library's history division was all about pumping up the idea of Arbitration Rock so people would visit the Onderdonk house. The real rock was blown up more than a century ago and used to build a house. What was dug up in the street some years back was your standard glacial erratic, nothing more. But add a little story to it, and it becomes an icon.

Anonymous said...

If the church is so important, why didn't the community make an effort to buy it BEFORE the developer bought it?
Stop seeing developers as greedy bad people. the developer bought the site knowing that the church was not a landmark, and he paid good money for it. He may tear it down if he wants to, and this would be legal as well as moral.

Anonymous said...

Because the Korean Church that owned it never listed it for sale. The developer approached them and offered them a mint for it and they took it in violation of the restrictive covenant in place since the 1800s.

Anonymous said...

"The developer bought it knowing that it wasn't a landmark"

The developer bought it knowing he would need a zoning change. I won't feel sorry for the prick if his application gets rejected.