A 13-year old passerby, William Janicek of Beach Street, in the Bronx, rescued two cousins who had sunk waist deep into a "mud dump" at Storey and Beach Avenues. Janicek built a "pontoon" out of old crates and scrap lumber to get to the boys. The cousins, Louis Santaniello, 15, of Theriot Street and Patrick Perhelia of Beach Street, had walked across the dump after an afternoon at Clauson (sic) Point (aka Clason Point) on the Long Island Sound. Their companion, Eric Gruber, 15, of Westchester Avenue, had managed to struggle back to dry land to assist in the rescue.
Clason Point once was known as the Coney Island of the Bronx Its heyday had come and gone by 1946 but is still had amusements and shops, open fields and fishing spots, much of which would be replaced by housing after the war. The area around Westchester Avenue was the most built up. Public housing built before the war in the neighborhood was known even then for a high crime rate. There were military barracks in the area as well and lots of undeveloped space, including a few farms and a lot of swampland. Forgotten New York has photos of the less developed area of Clason Point around Harding Park today..