Port Richmond

A 19-year-old man was in stable condition after he was hit by an NJ Transit train Wednesday evening in Port Richmond, police said. Cops said the man was hit about 6:30 p.m. on a railroad trestle above Aramingo Avenue near Wheatsheaf Lane. He suffered cuts and a possible broken leg, police said, and was taken to Hahnemann University Hospital in stable condition. It was unclear why the man was near the train tracks.  

You can take Cass Valle out of Port Richmond, but vows Valle, you'll never take Port Richmond out of her. Port Richmond, Valle's home for 60 years, remains the safe, clean and comfortable neighborhood of dependable people that existed when she arrived there with her family as a 5-year-old, Valle says. For the last 35 years, home for Valle has been a two-story brick rowhouse with an electric carriage lamp out front in the 3100 block of Cedar Street. She grew up in a rowhouse in the 3000 block of Tilton Street, a house where Democratic Party politics was a frequent topic.

A PORT RICHMOND man was arrested and charged Tuesday in a fatal hit-and-run that occurred almost two years ago, police said. Robert Sickman, 26, of Almond Street, surrendered to police Tuesday. He is accused of driving the car that struck William McCue, 28, about 2:20 a.m. April 10, 2011. McCue was walking home when a passing car struck him as he crossed Richmond Street near Sergeant, police said. He was pronounced dead at the scene, but the driver fled. Police recovered the vehicle the next morning and identified Sickman as the driver, but were unable to find him until Tuesday.

A pair of city sanitation workers had a whole different kind of mess to deal with in Port Richmond yesterday. The Streets Department workers were in the middle of collecting trash on Miller Street near Clearfield about 8:30 a.m. when they drew the wrath of a resident who appeared to be armed with a musket, of all things. The 42-year-old resident, whose name was not released, aimed an "antique, long-armed rifle" at the workers, threatened to shoot them and hollered racial remarks before darting inside his house, said police spokesman Lt. Raymond Evers.

What happened to the homeless people who were evicted from under Interstate 95 in Port Richmond last week? The Daily News touched base with four of them Monday. Three were staying in shelters Monday night, and a fourth has been living temporarily in Kensington. After going to Washington last Tuesday with Occupy Philly and Fight for Philly folks to rally for the extension of unemployment insurance, these four and others returned to Philadelphia Friday. Paul Klemmer, 53, an educated man who said he had dropped out of college, said he's still working toward creating a commune with like-minded people.

MARIE'S BEAUTY Salon in Port Richmond was the place to go to hear a good story by an expert raconteur, have some laughs and, oh, yes, get your hair done.   For more than 50 years, Port Richmond ladies did just that, drawn to the shop at Cedar Avenue and Ann Street not only by the skill of the hairdressers but by the captivating personality of the owner, Marie T. "Nan" Baker. Nan could tell a joke or a funny story — complete with sometimes politically incorrect dialects — to compete with most comics.

The first day's sting was gone, but the odor of nail polish remover still wafted through the Port Richmond air yesterday as crews in gas masks pumped the last of 1,000 gallons of spilled chemicals out of the Delaware River. Coast Guard officials said a total of 12,843 gallons of the chemical cumene spewed from an open 6-inch valve on the Norwegian tanker Jo Rogn, but most of it had been contained on the deck. The tanker's letter of compliance - a permit to unload chemicals in the United States - has been revoked pending the outcome of the investigation into the cause of the spill, Coast Guard Boatswain Mate One John Robinson said yesterday.

OVER THE PAST two days, supporters of the two adults arrested in an attack this month on a Port Richmond coach told a radically different version of what happened. They said that Mark LaVelle was not attacked in his home and that they did not hear anyone call him a "white motherf-----. " Separately, a 17-year-old boy who was also arrested contends he was just a witness to the attack, not a doer. LaVelle, 37, yesterday disputed their accounts and maintained that he was indeed attacked after he sheltered two white teens in his house from a "mob" of blacks and Hispanics.