Quick, Spell...

The name of the military Polish-Lithuanian engineer who came to the United States in 1776 and helped the Continental Army build fortifications that helped defeat the British was Thaddeus Kosciuszko.

You might be able to say the name, but can you spell it? Not many people can. And that includes life-long New Yorkers who might be expected to know these things.

But why is the mustard spelled Kosciusko? No z. Is it because the Kosciuszko family didn't give their permission to memorialize their hero on a jar of 'spicy brown' mustard? Whose picture is on the label in the front, depicted in a small cameo, in between those those two words?

It happens to be great mustard, and we always have several jars in the house. It's great on the Karl Ehmer hot dogs, and the kielbasa that we include in our dinner repertoire.

There is of course the Kosciuszko bridge that spans the Newton creek that separates parts of Queens from Brooklyn, two boroughs of New York City that are often referred to as the 'outer boroughs' by the New York Times. The New York City marathon route takes runners over the bridge, so how 'outer' can those boroughs be? No matter.

The Brooklyn neighborhood of Greenpoint and the Queens neighborhood of Maspeth are connected by the bridge. Greenpoint (pronounced Green-pernt by true New Yorkers) is a predominately Polish neighborhood. Thus, the name of the connecting bridge makes sense. Traditionally, window washers in the city came from Greenpoint. The urban legend says there are no dirty windows in Greenpoint.

The old bridge is in the process of being replaced by a more elegant looking span, and when the new bridge is completed, the old one will be blown up, according to Governor Cuomo. It's not sure if this demolition will be part of any July 4th celebration or not. Stay tuned.

The whole correct spelling of Kosciuszko was brought to mind when I read a piece in the Times that tried to trace the urban legend that there are alligators in the city's sewers. Apparently, the paper of record reported on February 10, 1935 the story of some youngsters who the day before were shoveling snow that revealed an alligator caught in a storm drain.  It was fished out.

This was near the Harlem River, in East Harlem, on 123rd Street. If anyone is familiar with this area, they will know that the famous restaurant Rao's is nearby. Perhaps only by coincidence, the alligator, on being pulled out of the storm drain, was whacked over the head repeatedly with shovels until it no longer had a pulse. Talk about a De Niro movie. That's how tough the neighborhood always was.

There is actually a date on the calendar, February 9th, that Mr. Miscione, the official borough historian of Manhattan, designates as Alligators in the Sewer Day to honor discarded or escaped beasts. (It is not known yet if there will be a Wild Steer Day to commemorate in the future the escaped steer that got loose in Queens yesterday.)

There is an actual gathering of people who turn out for this event and meet at the Greater Historical Historical Society in Queens. A trivia contents on city history is held, and one question was to correctly spell Kosciuszko. Apparently, no one got it right.

Yeah, but did someone who might have spelled it as it the name appears on a jar of mustard, Kosiusko, file an appeal?

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