JACKIE CONNOR CORNER DEDICATED

Early Saturday morning, Fonda Sera, owner of Zuzu’s Petals, was standing on a ladder attaching long, flowing puple ribbons to the lamp post on Seventh Avenue and Carroll Street. As I walked by, a Zuzu’s employee said, "Come back at 11 for the dedication."

An hour later, Council Members David Yasky and Bill DeBlasio, Bernard Graham, members of the NYPD, FDNY, shopkeepers, and many familiar Park Slope faces gathered to witness the unveiling and dedication of Jackie Connor’s Corner, a street sign in honor of a very special resident, which was covered with white paper until the moment it was dramatically pulled down with a string.

Jackie Connor, who died in the spring, was sometimes called the Mayor of Seventh Avenue. She used to sit on the steps of Old First Church or push a shopping cart up and down the avenue. Some thought she was a street person but she was really organizing, agitating, fighting for the rights of the little guy, the streets, and the community of Park Slope.

Civic minded doesn’t even begin to describe Connor, who cared deeply about this neighborhood, which was where she was born and raised. Everyone knew her and she knew everybody; she kept the police abreast of what was going on on Seventh Avenue by cell phone. And she had her pet peeves like flyers on lamp posts, which she waged a one-woman campaign to remove.

Two years ago, Connor was on the street in front of Zuzu’s Petals minutes after  fire that ravaged that store, Olive Vine and a Korean market early one morning. Fonda will never forget Connor’s unswerving support during what was a devestating time for her and her business.

Connor lived with with her husband in a Park Slope apartment and raised her family here. Her daughter is a reporter for the New York Daily News. She was at the ceremony on Saturday with her newborn baby.

After the ceremony, the event quickly became a photo op for the politicians posing together and with members of the community. You can’t blame them for trying to take the credit for getting the approvals necessary to make this street sign a reality so soon after her death. But the real credit goes to her family and friends who were eager to memorialize Connor in a meaningful way.

But talk about immortality. In the years to come, people will walk by that street sign and wonder who Jackie Connor was. Maybe there should be a plaque that tells the story of her life. Then people will know the person behind the name on the northwest corner of Carroll Street.

One thought on “JACKIE CONNOR CORNER DEDICATED”

  1. you make some very nice observations about the ceremony saturday morning, but you flinched to a shocking extent when you referred to the politicians and the photo op. why didn’t you name names? but maybe you didn’t see carl andrews squeeze-in and push jackie’s husband out of a photo that was being taken by one of the neighborhood papers.

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