Rename East Harlem Park For Sewer Alligators, Historian Says

EAST HARLEM, NY — A local historian has a unique idea for how to christen a brand-new East Harlem green space: name it after the myth of sewer alligators, which has its origins in a true neighborhood tale.

Michael Miscione, who served for more than a decade as the Manhattan Borough Historian, is focusing his efforts on a tiny, unnamed patch of plants recently built by the city on Paladino Avenue below the RFK Bridge on-ramp.

The concept of alligators roaming the city's subterranean sewer system has "fascinated me since my youth" despite being "generally speaking, not true," Miscione told East Harlem's Community Board 11 last month.

He's hardly alone: the sewer-alligator myth has inspired everything from public art to a scene in "The Simpsons."

Most New Yorkers might be unaware that the urban legend stems from a real-life incident that happened 87 years ago on East 123rd Street, steps from the parklet that Miscione wants to dub "Sewer Gator Park."

On a February afternoon in 1935, a group of boys were shoveling snow into a manhole near Second Avenue when one, 16-year-old Salvatore Condulucci, sensed something stirring in the drainpipe below him.

"What he saw, in the thickening dusk, almost caused him to topple into the icy cavern," the New York Times reported the next day. "Honest, it's an alligator!" Condulucci shouted to his friends, according to the Times.

The boys hauled the sickly-looking but very real gator out of the sewer, but after the reptile became "vicious," decided to kill it by slamming it with their snow shovels. They brought the deceased gator to a nearby repair shop, where it was photographed and weighed at 125 pounds.

Its origin has never been determined, but Miscione has a guess: magazines in the 1930s offered mail-order baby alligators to be shipped to people's homes, and the historian supposes that the East Harlem gator had been discarded by its owner after growing too large.

Miscione first approached the Parks Department about naming the green space, and was told he needed to demonstrate community support for the idea — prompting his visits to Community Board 11, he said last month.

Miscione's campaign has mostly gotten a warm reception, according to Jessica Elliott, chair of CB11 park's committee, which sought feedback from neighbors and discussed the proposal at multiple meetings.

Still, the committee opted against voting on the proposal during its latest meeting on Sept. 29, after board members said more input was needed from tenants of the NYCHA Wagner Houses, which sit in front of the small green space.

Miscione offered to "stand on a street corner with a clipboard and fliers" to solicit support for his proposal, vowing share his evidence with the community board.

Not every board member was enthused by the idea: David Giordano contrasted it negatively with the recent co-naming of an East Harlem street for the late actress Cicely Tyson, whom he said had "actually stood for something."

Sewer alligators, he said, are "a nice thing — but it ain't real."

Others expressed more openness, like Michelle Wiltshire-Clement, who sounded proud that the myth originated in East Harlem.

"So many people have heard that legend," she said. "I just think it’s kind of cool."

Have a Harlem news tip? Contact reporter Nick Garber at nick.garber@patch.com.