ASTOUNDING AUGUST MAGIC
PASSWORD: ST. MARKS CINEMA

Ice ice baby. They say that yesterday was the hottest day of 2006. The scariest day of 1980 was a Friday the 13th, when I was taken to see "Friday the 13th" at the St. Marks Cinema, a double feature with "Winter Kills." I was 8 years old. Yes, highly inappropriate for a 3rd grader. But it was 1980 in NYC - a glorious, raunchy, free for all. Bless those days. The St. Marks Cinema was on 8th Street and 2nd Avenue. It was shut down in the 80s and became a Gap, and now a pizza place, with sub par pizza. I can't say whether or not "Serpico" played at the St. Marks Cinema, but it will be playing in the breezy air-conditioned loveliness of White Rabbit on Monday night. And massage therapist Alex Fisher (New Lincoln/Source Academy) returns for a massagefest to cool those sweaty, pesky summer aches. $1 a minute.

And while we're on the subject of camping, the NYC Parks Department is sponsoring camp outs in the city parks this month. That means you can sleep in the park, hopefully without getting attacked! Call 311 and ask for the Urban Park Rangers Family Camping program. Do it right away to reserve a spot.
You guessed it, another playful quiz. Answers are posted at the bottom of: http://www.nycmagicgarden.com/Passwords.html:

AUGUST SERPICORIAN POLICE QUIZ

  1. New York's Finest refers to police officers and New York's Bravest refers to firefighters. Sanitation workers are known as what?
    a) New York's Cleanest b) New York's Strongest c) New York's Foulest d) New York's Feistiest
  2. Who are known as New York’s Boldest?
    a) correction officers b) district attorneys c) teachers d) Duane Reade clerks
  3. Who is the current NYC Police Commissioner?
  4. In the Al Pacino flick "Dog Day Afternoon" people are chanting what outside the Brooklyn bank that is being robbed?
    a) Attica b) We're Here, We're Queer c) Sonny d) Money for the Poor
  5. A 1969 Daily News headline read: "Homo Nest Raided, Queen Bees are Stinging Mad" when patrons of what Greenwich Village bar resisted arrest, causing an infamous riot?
  6. The Astor Place Riots of 1849 involved which of the following?
    a) barbers b) bongs c) cigarette taxes d) theaters
  7. The jail known as The Tombs, built in 1835, is the largest receiving area in the country. The title character of Herman Melville’s 1853 short story "Bartelby the Scrivener" died in the Tombs. What was Bartelby’s famous phrase?
    a) Thank you for your support b) I prefer not to c) The Queen is dead d) No more yanky my wanky, the Donger need food
  8. Until 1973 the NYC police headquarters were at what Manhattan address?
    a) 1 Police Plaza b) 2 Federal Hall c) 240 Centre Street d) 7 Court Street
  9. Which US President and NYC native (from Gramercy) was once NYC Police Commissioner? Hint - He is referred to many times in Caleb Carr's "The Alienist."
  10. The first recorded death of a police officer in the line of duty was in 1854. Since then, approximately how many police officers have been killed in the line of duty?
    a) 180 b) 600 c) 2800 d) 9000
  11. Extra Credit: True or False?
    Mustaches were once a mandatory part of the uniform for NYC police officers.
  12. Extra Credit: True or Truer?
    According to one popular theory, the term "copper," or "cop" was coined in 1845 as a nickname for police offers because of the star shaped copper badge worn as part of their uniform.
  13. Extra Credit: True or Trueiest?
    Walter Mathau was once a boxing coach for the police department.

    And I couldn't resist sharing the following info:
    1880s chief of detectives Thomas F. Byrnes was the first person to create a "mug book" - containing photographs of 7000 known criminals. He focused his energies on the financial district where money, stocks, bonds, precious metals, etc. were carried around by hand and thus stolen by criminals with great regularity. While his contemporaries looked to the obvious brothels and saloons for payoffs, he thought his wealth could be made with Wall Street bankers and brokers, who had a lot more money. In 1880 he declared that any known criminal seen below Fulton Street could be arrested immediately, whether or not they had committed a crime, if the officer felt they did not have a proper explanation for being there. It worked; in 1887 Byrnes said that not a penny had been stolen in those seven years. As Wall Street continued to prosper, Byrnes effectively protected these moneymakers, and was undoubtedly paid back for his efforts. In 1894, when a group of reformers called the Lexow Committee began a huge investigation of police corruption in NYC, Byrnes quickly left public service and retired, living off of a $350,000 fortune that he somehow amassed on his $2000 annual salary. Gotta love corruption! Gotta see "Serpico."

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