Below the Patch piece, "Hoboken's History of Fires" voices of the dead speak through survivors and relatives.
How can we forget them? How do we honor them?
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Below the Patch piece, "Hoboken's History of Fires" voices of the dead speak through survivors and relatives.
How can we forget them? How do we honor them?
The fires of the 70s/80s are the most egregious example of the impact of developer interests' on Hoboken.
ReplyDeleteTo answer your question, I think we should have a memorial. It's wrong to sweep it under the rug. Over 40 deaths and no prosecutions? Yet we refused FBI support?
ReplyDeleteIt's a chapter in our history. Those are to be recalled, however discomforting it may be. We just added a WW1 Memorial in 2009. Surely the events of 1970s into the early 1980s are as much a part of who we are as the events of 1917 & 1918.
"Por la Gente" had fire-watches to prevent the arsonists, unfortunately they were one day too late for their scheduled stakeout at 1200 Washington where I believe 12 or 13 people were murdered this way.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't until the NY media started poking cameras, mics and lights into the faces at city hall that the arson slowed down and stopped.
There are people who made a lot of money when their buildings went condo after a fire and many have blood on their hands. Some still live amongst us.
This is a very, very sad chapter of our city's history that is largely unacknowledged because those slaughtered were disenfranchised blacks and latinos.
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ReplyDeleteHas to be the most disgusting period in Hoboken's history. They should have followed the money, but the politicians covered it up. Perhaps someday the victim's family and friends will receive closure and justice.
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