For years, the chair had served as the daily roost of Ralph Acosta, a fixture on this quiet Harlem block.

It started a minor fashion revolution on their Harlem block.

In October, the authorities said, they brought narcotics charges against five members of another gang, known as the McRae Family, which was operating on or near the same Harlem block.

When he was considering starting his church on a forlorn Harlem block in the 1970's, Mr. Mann told people that he could hardly have found a more apt place for a ministry.

Indeed, much of the outcry on that Harlem block, packed with hundreds of people young and old, came in furious tones.

No small detail said more about how this Harlem block was changing.

She had an apartment to herself in the same Harlem block as Mr. Big and she had been kept virtually a prisoner there for the past year.

A boy travels to a grimy, boarded-up building on a desolate Harlem block where his grandparents, the last Jewish residents in the neighborhood, reside.

For Sister Betty - as she is known to many - it's all part of a campaign to clean up the Harlem block where she has lived since 1984.

With a Bible and a Bellow The Rev. Betty Neal has been waging a campaign to rid her Harlem block of drugs and crime.