Union Course Racetrack (Queens)
Present name:None
Location:At the southwest corner of Jamaica Avenue and 78th Street
Honoree: Union Course Racetrack opened on October 15, 1821, in Woodhaven Queens. It was the first dirt racetrack in the United States and was the site of one of the earliest and most famous races between Northern and Southern bred horses. It also served as an army encampment for several years during the Civil War. The track has been closed for nearly 150 years, however, remnants of the track remain on Clemente Court on 82nd Street. (Holden)
LL:2022/54

US Navy RM2/c Stanley E. Wdowiak Way (Queens)
Present name:None
Location:At the northeast corner of 64th Street and Flushing Avenue
Honoree:  Stanley Wdowiak (1925-1988) served in WWII as a Radioman Second Class on board the destroyer excort U.S.S. Pillsbury. He received the Navy Cross from the President of the United States for his extraordinary heroism and devotion to duty when the U.S.S. Pillsbury captured the German Submarine U-505, on June 4, 1944, off Cape Blanco in French West Africa. The submarine was running on the surface with enemy personnel below setting demolition charges and scuttling. Stanley Wdowiak, with two other crew members of the U.S.S. Pillsbury, plunged down the conning tower of the enemy submarine and captured the German crewman. Eventually, the enemy submarine was towed to Bermuda. (Holden)
LL:2020/26

US Navy Seaplane Division One Way (Queens)
Present name:None
Location:Northeast corner of Beach Channel Drive and Beach 169th Street
Honoree: In April of 1919, the US Navy created Naval Seaplane Division One, consisting of four NC (Navy Curtiss) seaplanes, for the express purpose of planning and executing the first transatlantic flight. To accomplish this mission, hundreds of Naval personnel, including pilots, mechanics, riggers and support staff, were transferred to the Rockaway Naval Air Station along with employees of the Curtiss Aviation Company. The parts for the aircraft were built at factories in Manhattan, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Garden City, Long Island, and were assembled and flight-tested in Rockaway. On May 8, 1919, three of the aircraft took off from Jamaica Bay with planned stops in Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, the Azores, and Lisbon. On May 27, 1919, one of the aircraft, the NC-4, landed in Lisbon, becoming the first aircraft to fly across the ocean. The other two aircraft had mechanical issues and only made it as far as the Azores. Navigator (Navy LCDR) Albert Read, Pilots (Navy Lt.) Walter Hinton and (CG Lt.) Elmer Stone, (Navy Lt.) Radioman Herbert Rodd, and mechanics (Navy CMM) Eugene Rhoads and (Navy CMM) James Breese were honored for being “First Across.” Four days later, the crew completed the mission by flying to Plymouth, England to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrims sailing in the opposite direction. (Ulrich)
LL:2018/139

USMC Lance Corporal John Carlo Kopacska Place (Queens)
Present name:None
Location:Intersection of 158th Street and Riverside Drive
Honoree: Lance Corporal Kopacska (1945-1967) graduated top of his class in Automotive High School in 1965 and dreamed of opening his own Texaco service station. He enlisted in the Marines in 1965. He was killed in the line of duty during the Vietnam War at the age of 21.
LL:2008/48