A plaque remaining from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem.

Above, a 1934 plaque from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem. Discarded as trash in 2006. Now a Popeyes fast food restaurant on Google Maps.

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Entry from November 25, 2004
PAL (Police Athletic League)
"PAL" (the Police Athletic League) started in the Depression and is still going. Supposedly, it all began in Tuckahoe, New York?

http://www.tuckahoe.com/police/history.htm
http://www.tuckahoe.com/police/history.htm
Another interesting fact about the Tuckahoe Police Department is that it is the birthplace of the Police Athletic League, more commonly known as the P. A. L. The story tells how Patrolman Milton A. Gibbons was asked by Westchester County Court Judge George W. Smyth in 1930 to take six local youngsters under his wing. Officer Gibbons had been appealed to by the mothers of the youths who were involved in an infraction and charged with rifling a penny vending machine. Judge Smyth asked Patrolman Gibbons "to keep an eye" on the youngsters and keep them out of trouble during their probationary period. It was then that Patrolman Gibbons came up with the idea that the most effective way to combat juvenile delinquency was to make the cop the friend of the youth in his community.

With that thought Patrolman Gibbons started the Tuckahoe Police Associates. He then trained the local youth about boxing and wrestling. Within a year the youth of Tuckahoe were carrying off amateur prizes as boxers and wrestlers throughout the East. Later on Patrolman Gibbons added other activities such as baseball, football, basketball, a fife and drum corps and a cadet corps. Annual track and field contests were also being staged.

So highly effective was Gibbons' work that within a period of 10 years Tuckahoe achieved a record of having had not one reported case of juvenile delinquency. Patrolman Gibbons received many tributes and letters of commendation for his work, including letters of praise from N.Y. Governor Herbert Lehman and President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Included in his letter, President Roosevelt praised the fact that 615 boys, every member of the Tuckahoe Police Associates over the age of 18, were members of the armed forces.

The value of Patrolman Gibbons work with the boys in the village became so widely known that in 1934 the Police Department of Washington D.C. consulted with him and started a program of its own patterned after the Tuckahoe P. A. L. Two years later the New York City Police Department followed suit and organized its own P. A. L. Many others also took it up including the Mount Vernon Police in 1939 and the Yonkers Police in 1941.

14 July 1936, New York Times, pg. 17:
The bureau had selected Earl to be the first boy to receive one of the new two-piece khaki uniforms of the Police Athletic League, 20,000 of which are to be distributed throughout the city next week. A series of neighborhood social affairs under bureau auspices and enrollment of adult sponsors of the P. A. L. at $1 each will pay for the trim outfits.

21 April 1938, New York Times, pg. 15:
POLICE NOW "PALS"
TO 75,000 CHILDREN
(...)
The Police Athletic League, which spells "PAL" to 75,000 boys and girls of this city, made public yesterday its ammual report on the relations between the "cop" on the corner and the small "kids" who play on the sidewalks of New York. They get along very well, according to the report.

The league, which has among its aims to cut juvenile delinquency and build citizenship, increased its membership by 40,000 last year. So eager were teh children for membership and alliance with the Police Department that they even paid annual dues of 10 cents.
(...)
The league, which operates in all five boroughs, has an adult associate membership of 13,000. It has sixty-nine indoor centers at strategic points. It covers a wide field in outdoor recreation and is aided by the education and recreation department of the Works Progress Administration.

(Trademark)
Word Mark POLICE ATHLETIC LEAGUE PAL N.Y.C.
Goods and Services IC 025. US 039. G & S: clothing, footwear and headgear; namely, warm-up suits, sweat shirts, sweat pants, T-shirts, sport caps, jackets and athletic footwear. FIRST USE: 19340701. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19340701
IC 041. US 107. G & S: arranging and conducting athletic competitions and programs for children ages three through eighteen, educational services; namely, providing courses of preschool educational programs; and library services. FIRST USE: 19340701. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19340701

IC 006. US 050. G & S: trophies of common metal. FIRST USE: 19600920. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19600920

IC 018. US 003. G & S: all purpose carrying cases for sports equipment, such as tennis racquets, baseball and softball bats, baseball gloves, baseball catcher's protective gear, athletic clothing, athletic shoes, basketballs, baseballs and tennis balls. FIRST USE: 19600920. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 19600920

Mark Drawing Code (3) DESIGN PLUS WORDS, LETTERS, AND/OR NUMBERS
Design Search Code 240103
Serial Number 74207981
Filing Date September 30, 1991
Current Filing Basis 1A
Original Filing Basis 1A
Published for Opposition November 9, 1993
Registration Number 1818724
Registration Date February 1, 1994
Owner (REGISTRANT) POLICE ATHLETIC LEAGUE, INC. NON-PROFIT CORPORATION NEW YORK 34 1/2 East 12th Street New York NEW YORK 10003
Attorney of Record PHILIP T. SHANNON
Disclaimer NO CLAIM IS MADE TO THE EXCLUSIVE RIGHT TO USE "N.Y.C." APART FROM THE MARK AS SHOWN
Type of Mark TRADEMARK. SERVICE MARK
Register PRINCIPAL-2(F)-IN PART
Affidavit Text SECT 15. SECT 8 (6-YR). SECTION 8(10-YR) 20040319.
Renewal 1ST RENEWAL 20040319
Live/Dead Indicator LIVE
Distinctiveness Limitation Statement as to the words "POLICE ATHLETIC LEAGUE"

Posted by Barry Popik
Sports/Games • Thursday, November 25, 2004 • Permalink


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