On the borough of Staten Island, it's not rare to see parks dedicated to American heroes. Oftentimes, these men and 
women were once residents of Staten Island. A good example would be Joseph Manna Park, which honors Seaman First Class Radioman Joseph Manna. Joseph Manna was an Italian immigrant who came to the United States and volunteered for the Second World War in 1941, at the age of seventeen. Unfortunately, the ship on which he had become a radioman sank on October 11, 1942.
In 1958, the parcel of land now known as Joseph Manna Park was acquired by the City of New York. In 1971, the New York State Department of Transportation had taken over the site, as the Staten Island Expressway was to be built there. However, the parcel was deemed unnecessary and sat as a vacant plot of land for many years. Finally, in 1991, it was transferred over to the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. The following year, it was named to honor Joseph Manna.
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Within the park, you can find three separate memorials. The first memorial is the Joseph Manna Memorial, which was dedicated on May 22, 1993. It consists of a plaque posted on a boulder which states that Joseph Manna was a Radioman for the United States Navy, who "went down with the U.S.S. Duncan off the Solomon Islands" on at the 
age of eighteen. The second memorial is the Port Authority World War II Honor Roll, which gives a long list of the names of the "men and women of the Port of New York Authority who served our country in World War II". The third memorial consists of the Gill and Bloom Plaques. This memorial honors Harry A. Gill and Edward A. Bloom, two men who died in France during the First World War. The last memorial is the Frank and Constantino Busso memorial, which was dedicated on November 16, 1996 to honor two men who died in the Second World War.
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