By Dustin Brown
Years have gone by since the days when Vinny Giammona ruled the streets of Bayside from his home perch at the yellow house on the corner of 42nd Avenue and 202nd Street.
But his playful exuberance endured Saturday afternoon as more than 200 people gathered to dedicate a street sign in memory of the Sept. 11 hero, whose zest for life remained infectious even after his death.
“Vinny's involved with us here right now,” said his father, retired Capt. Vincent M. Giammona, as a furry brown collie mischievously wandered near the microphone, eliciting shrieks of laughter from Vinny's four daughters. “The little disruptions – his spirit is here.”
A 17-year veteran of the Fire Department, Vincent F. Giammona was stationed at Ladder Co. 5 in Greenwich Village when he died answering the call at the Twin Towers on Sept. 11, 2001, his 40th birthday.
His name is now emblazoned outside his childhood home on a street sign that reads, “Captain Vincent F. Giammona Way,” a new name for the stretch of 42nd Avenue between 201st and 202nd streets.
Giammona's four young daughters – Francesca, 10; Toni-Ann, 7; Nicolette, 5; and Daniella, 3 – all grabbed hold of the string affixed to the sign's paper wrapping as they pulled it off together during the noon ceremony, unveiling the sign named for their father.
“As his children grow up, they will watch and walk by this sign and remember,” said City Councilman Tony Avella (D-Bayside), who put in the request for the street renaming. He then turned to the family to say, “We're here because we owe you a tremendous debt.”
The street is one of many blocks across the city that the City Council voted to rename for individuals who died in the Sept. 11 rescue.
“What we can do and must do and will do is never forget,” said Capt. Frank Coughlin of Ladder Co. 5, where Giammona had been stationed. “Vinny is one of the most important people of our generation, a hero of historic proportions.”
But Vinny, he said, would have laughed if he heard their lofty praise. “'You've gotta be kidding, right?'” Coughlin imagined Vinny spurting out in response to what was being said about him.
But Coughlin said: “We're not kidding.”
Giammona earned the moniker “Lieutenant Fun' with his comrades in Ladder Co. 5, a name that captured his demeanor in the firehouse as well as his antics growing up.
“His 40 years were equal to anybody else's 100,” his father said.
The elder Giammona told stories about how his son once brought home a turkey he had won in a raffle so he could release it in a park and how his short-lived boxing career earned him a headline in the Daily News.
“Vinny's boxing career ended undefeated – 1 and 0 – and he was happy,” Giammona said.
His son's heroics did not end when he left the firehouse either. Once he chased a purse snatcher into a train tunnel – securing the prize and returning it to the startled victim – while another time he slid under a Long Island Rail Road train to help a man who fell beneath it.
All the while the family-loving firefighter considered Bayside his home, even after he moved with his wife and children to Valley Stream, L.I. and after his parents sold the house he grew up in to Ozanam Hall a couple of years ago. The street sign, his father said, only reaffirms that connection.
“It will ever give Vinny the wish to stay in Bayside,” his father said, “the town he loved.”
Reach reporter Dustin Brown by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 718-229-0300, Ext. 154.
