Upper West Side Store Is Hurt by Staten Island Flooding

David W. Dunlap/The New York Times Donna Schofield, behind the counter, is the proprietor of the Stationery and Toy store at 125 West 72nd Street, which lost most of its inventory in storage on Staten Island to flooding from Hurricane Sandy.

On first hearing, it simply did not make sense. How could Stationery and Toy, a cherished, packed daughter-and-pop store at 125 West 72nd Street, have lost almost all of its inventory during Hurricane Sandy? After all, the Upper West Side was barely discommoded by the storm. Most residents suffered from nothing much more serious than survivor's guilt.

David W. Dunlap/The New York Times Donna Schofield.

When the store failed to open on that Tuesday, however, neighbors knew something was wrong. What they did not yet know was that the proprietor, Donna Schofield, 46, was still trapped in her house in Midland Beach, Staten Island, which had been inundated with up to 15 feet of water.

It was not until Tuesday afternoon, Oct. 30, that rescuers arrived by boat to evacuate Ms. Schofield; her husband; their two children, 8 and 17; her father, Larry Gomez, who works at the store on weekends; and 13 other people - some of them strangers - who had waded their way to the Schofields' three-story house on Olympia Boulevard because it was the highest ground around on Monday night.

That house survived. However, three smaller buildings nearby that Ms. Schofield had used as storehouses were destroyed. Inside lay most of the inventory for the Upper West Side store, including all the newly arrived Hanukkah- and Thanksgiving-themed merchandise. Most of the waterlogged goods, beyond salvaging, were carted away. The three buildings were declared uninhabitable.

Total insurance proceeds: $300, for lost roof shingles. The family, accustomed to dealing with floods of three or four feet and prepared for 8 to 10 feet of water, did not carry flood insurance, in part because none of its properties were mortgaged.

On the Wednesday morning, Ms. Schofield told her father she was going to work. “We have to open,” she said. “We really need the money.”

She telephoned her employees. Two said t hey would be willing to walk to the store from their homes on 119th Street and 124th Street. Stationery and Toy resumed business at 11:30 a.m. on Oct. 31 and has been rebuilding its inventory since, on a much diminished scale.

David W. Dunlap/The New York Times Christmas shopping.

Ms. Schofield first opened the store in 1986, offering toys and office supplies because those were the lines carried at her father's wholesale business in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Over time, she added art supplies and party supplies. Lots of them. Floor to ceiling.

“It's like a magic attic,” said Valerie Markwood, an artist and loyal customer, who on Friday was in the market for a pen with silver ink.

Another customer asked about 1099 forms. Yes, they were in stock. Fountain pen nibs? Yes. Address labels? Yes. Boxes of writing paper? Yes. Manual pencil sharpeners? Yes. X-Acto knives? Yes.

The man who bought the nib returned. It wasn't working. Ms. Schofield fixed it. “Now you can write your love letters,” she said.

David W. Dunlap/The New York Times A young customer.

To the man buying a 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle: “Are you ready for the challenge?” To the woman buying eight three-ring binders: “You sure you want to do all this work?” To the little girl who had been given a lollipop at a nearby bank: “Tell them they're supposed to give you a bagel in the morning.”

To the woman buying two hula hoops: “Are you going to practice for us?” To the boy who was asking his mother to hand over the Playmobil racecar she had just bought: “You jump in your stroller and mommy's going to give it you.” He complied instantly.

In the past two months, Ms. Schofield has learned what it means to be a neighborhood institution. “You don't feel it when you work here day to day,” she said on Friday, her head and shoulders barely visible through the wreath of merchandise around the front counter. “You don't realize that you're part of their families and their lives.”

Word of her plight spread. A video by the International Institute for Learning, “Sandy Comes Calling,” was posted on YouTube.

Neighbors rallied. A customer, Nell Hanks, came up with an ingenious toy drive, DNAinfo.com New York reported. Donors bought toys at Ms. Schofield's store for donation to needy children on Staten Island.

Among the donors was Eric Helms, the president of Juice Generation, which operates a juice bar at 117 West 72nd Street. He explained his devotion to Ms. Schofield during a visit Friday to buy a single padded envelope.

Not only does she run an appealingly old-school store, he said, but she couldn't have been more neighborly when he opened his 72nd Street outlet in 1999.

“She would send us customers,” Mr. Helms recalled. “She would put our menus in her windows. I would come to her for advice on operating in the neighborhood. Where's a notary public? Who's your lawyer?”

David W. Dunlap/The New York Times

Not wanting to call attention to a good deed, Mr. Helms declined to say how much he had given. Ms. Schofield was not so reluctant. She said that when Mr. Helms asked how much money would buy a meaningful number of toys, she answered $500. He pressed her. O.K., she said, maybe $1,000. He donated $2,500. “I thought I was going to have a heart attack,” Ms. Schofield recalled happily. “That's a lot of toys.”

Juice Generation vans took the toys out to the St. George Theater on Staten Island for distribution. Mr. Helms said the drivers had grumbled at first about the mission but had come back beaming - and wearing red Santa hats.

Last week, there was a bit of Christmas cheer for Ms. Schofield. Painters were working on her house, bringing her return from a furnished apartment in South Beach one day closer.

“By the end of January,” she said, “we should be back home.”

She meant Staten Island, of course. But to spe nd two hours with Ms. Schofield and her customers in the little shop on West 72nd Street was to be persuaded that in a sense, she was home already.

Let the 2012 Presidential Campaign Books Begin

Here come the quickie journalistic accounts of the 2012 campaign.

“Panic: 2012 â€"The Sublime and Terrifying Inside Story of Obama's Final Campaign,” by Michael Hastings, who covered the campaign for Buzzfeed, will be released Jan. 15, his publisher Blue Rider Press said on Sunday. The book is being published in digital format only, Blue Rider said, “so as to bring this riveting account to readers as quickly as possible.”

The publisher said that the book was in the spirit of the Hunter S. Thompson classic “Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail” and “gives a firsthand account of the madness traveling with the White House press corps, bringing to life a series of unforgettably strange moments from the trail.”

Mr. Hastings has a history of tangling with the administration. In a 2010 Rolling Stone magazine article, he revealed that Gen. Stanley McChrystal was openly contemptuous of how the White House was handling the war in Afghanistan, which eventually led to his being stripped of command. It also became the basis of a book by Mr. Hastings called “The Operators.”

More recently, Mr. Hastings has been a critic of the administration's handling of national security matters, especially at the United States Consulate in Benghazi.

\'The Hobbit\' Stays No. 1 at the Box Office

The weekend before Christmas is typically a weird one for Hollywood. It is one of the only periods all year when a movie's performance over its first three days does not necessarily signal how good (or bad) total ticket sales will be; ticket buyers may still materialize in significant numbers over the holiday week.

“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” distributed by Warner Brothers, was No. 1 at North American theaters over the weekend, taking in about $36.7 million, for a two-week total of $149.9 million, according to Hollywood.com, which compiles box-office data. Placing second was “Jack Reacher,” which overcame prerelease troubles - Paramount canceled promotional events after the Connecticut school massacre - to sell about $15.6 million in tickets; “Jack Reacher,” which cost roughly $60 milli on to make, received an A-minus score from audiences in exit polls, boding well for word of mouth.

Judd Apatow's heavily marketed comedy “This Is 40” (Universal) was third, taking in about $12 million. That total was in line with expectations, and Universal deemed it “good.” But audiences gave Mr. Apatow's weakly reviewed movie a B-minus in exit polls, indicating a rough road ahead. But it cost a relatively inexpensive $35 million to make.

DreamWorks Animation's “Rise of the Guardians” was fourth, taking in about $5.9 million, for a five-week total of $79.7 million. Steven Spielberg's “Lincoln” (Disney) continued to chug along, placing fifth, with an estimated $5.6 million in ticket sales, for a seven-week total of $116.8 million.

Man Exonerated in Central Park Rape Is Charged With Assault

One of the five young men who were wrongly convicted more than 20 years ago of raping and beating a woman in Central Park was arrested earlier this week and charged with menacing and assault stemming from an encounter in October at the park's northeast corner, the authorities said.

According to a police spokesman, the man, Kharey Wise, turned himself in on Wednesday and was charged after a woman said that he apparently threw an object at her near Fifth Avenue and 110th Street.

The episode, which took place on Oct. 1, began as Mr. Wise, 40, was arguing with a 30-year-old woman, who was not identified by the authorities. As she began to walk away, a police official said, a “square object” sailed over her shoulder and struck the ground. When she turned around, the official said, Mr. Wise was “standing and staring at her.”

Afterward, Mr. Wise followed her for several blocks, apologizing, the official said. The wom an entered a building to pick up her child, the official said, and when she emerged, Mr. Wise was gone.

According to a criminal complaint, the woman said that “a brick came from behind her and crashed to the ground next to her.”

“No one else was behind her except for the defendant,” the complaint added.

The arrest was first reported on Saturday in The New York Daily News.

Mr. Wise was among five teenagers who confessed in 1989 to attacking a young woman in Central Park. The woman was raped, beaten and left for dead, and the case was seen by many as emblematic of the lawlessness of the period.

The five young men later said that their confessions were coerced, and they were exonerated in 2002 after another man, Matias Reyes, was found to have committed the crime.

More recently, Mr. Wise and the others were the subjec t of a book, published in 2011 by Sarah Burns, and a film, “The Central Park Five,” released this year by Ms. Burns, her husband, David McMahon, and her father, Ken Burns.

Thieves Target Volunteers Aiding Staten Island

Days after powerful waves created by Hurricane Sandy washed over parts of Staten Island and left devastation behind, a group of people from other states arrived in New York City saying they wanted to help.

The volunteers were from a Massachusetts-based group called All Hands. They were willing to work for free but needed a place to stay, so members of the New York City Council got in touch with the Rev. Kevin Fisher of St. Mary's Episcopal Church near the North Shore of Staten Island.

Over the last several weeks, Father Fisher said on Saturday, the volunteers have helped repair damage to homes on Staten Island. Many people have been grateful, but two thieves saw the volunteers as targets.

The police said that a young man and a young woman entered St. Mary's earlier this week and stole items belonging to the volunteers, including clothes, a guitar, a backpack, a laptop computer, a camera and cellphones.

The two had come to the church the week before, too, and made off with other items, including computers, said Father Fisher, who called the thefts “a disgrace to the island.” In both instances, he said, security cameras showed images of the thieves entering the church while the volunteers were out working.

Father Fisher said that about 15 volunteers, from places like Massachusetts, California and Kentucky, had been staying regularly at the church, sleeping on air bags and using the premises as an organizing hub to coordinate additional volunteers who show up on weekends, when their numbers have swelled to nearly 100.

The volunteers have worked about 12 hours a day, Father Fisher said, tearing sodden drywall and carpets from homes and helping to scrub mold from walls and wooden beams. So far, he said, the group had helped clean about 90 homes.

“They are down-to-earth people, they are humble a nd they are giving,” Father Fisher said. “The work they are doing is absolutely essential.”