Primo Autobody Repair

11-27 Irving Avenue | Ridgewood | built 1931

The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

2012
October
Lead shielding goes into a radioactive Ridgewood auto body shop
The shop's building once housed the Wolff-Alport Chemical Company, which extracted rare earth minerals from sand and dumped or buried its thorium waste, leaving the ground radioactive. Workers at Primo Autobody Repair were estimated to take in three times the safe yearly dose. Between October 2012 and April 2014, lead shielding topped with concrete was laid inside three buildings and a steel plate was welded over the sidewalk.
Source: atlasobscura.com
2024
Primo Autobody leaves for Brooklyn as the EPA closes the site for cleanup
Atlas Obscura called this small repair shop the most radioactive place in New York City, a result of the thorium the Wolff-Alport Chemical Company left in the ground. By June 2024 the business had moved to Brooklyn, and the EPA had shut the area down so the contamination could be cleaned up.
Source: atlasobscura.com

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