Newsday from New York, New York • 24

Phone Items to (212) 303-2850 i I STUYVESANT TOWN Hospice Is Looking for Volunteers The Jacob Perlow Hospice of Beth Israel Medical Center is looking for volunteers to help care for the terminally ill and their families. The volunteers will be trained in a program that begins in February. A few hours a week, volunteers will work with a hospice team doctors, nurses, social workers and clergy in providing care at the hospitals inpatient unit and in homes in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. The hospital is on First Avenue at 16th Street. For information call (212) 420-2844.

UPPER EAST SIDE Ex-Envoy To Discuss Mideast Situation Rita Hauser, American chairwoman of the International Center for Peace in the Middle East, will moderate a two-part lecture series, Prospects for Peace in the Middle East, at 8 p.m. Jan. 12 and 19 in the 92nd Street 1395 Lexington Ave. Hauser, a former U.S. delegate to the United Nations General Assembly and representative to the UN Commission on Human Rights, was also one of live American Jews who met in Stockholm with Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat.

Subscriptions to the series are $24. Single tickets are $13. For tickets, call (212) 996-1100. Newxday JelTi ny A. Salter Construction Continues Construction worker Steve Coyle puts up a protective barrier on the side of the Municipal Building, near the base of the Brooklyn Bridge.

Bo Diddley, Chubby Checker. Ike and Tina Turner, Marvin Gaye and Jackie Wilson. At 7 p.m. next Thursday, live entertainment will be provided by Cleveland Still and the Dubs of Could This Be Magic and Chapel of Dreams fame. Admission is $5 for adults and $3 for seniors and students with proper ID.

For more information or group rates, contact Gregory Javan Mills at (212) 873-5040 or (212) 302-0161. hour of rare and historical footage. The festival, a program of the Museum of African American History and Arts, will be held in the Arts Gallery of the Adam Clayton Powell Jr. State Office Building, 163 W. 125th from 1 to 10 p.m.

next Thursday and Friday. Complete shows are scheduled for 1 p.m., 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. Some of the stars of this special film program are James Brown the Famous Flames, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, the Shirelles, the Coasters, HARLEM Black Film Festival Of Rock iT Roll Legends During the fifth Annual Black Film Festival of the legends of rock roll, the audience will not only see the uncut version of Let the Good Times Roll and I Promise to Remember The Frankie Lymon Story, but more than an I I I I I I I i i i MANHATTAN CLOSEUP Custom House and Tree Lighted By Jessie Mangaliman The light rose slowly, like that of full moon. And for the first time in its 81 years, the U.S.

Custom House at Bowling Green an official landmark that has been called one of the finest Beaux Arts building in the country was illuminated outside. If there is one building in New York that approaches the Paris Opera House in scale, site and philosophy, this bit of imperial grandeur is it, says Essential New York, an architectural guide book. It wasnt exactly lit like the Paris Opera House, because the light came from two modest pairs of white vapor lamps. A master of ceremonies, William J. Diamond, regional administrator' for the General Services Administration, rang a bell, signaling the start of the lighting ceremony.

The GSA is the federal government agency that manages the building. After the switch was flipped, it took a few minutes for the lights to warm up in the frigid weather As they waited, onlookers shuffled their feet and tightened scarves, while the New York Choral Society sang Halleliyah! Hallelujah! And in the final triumphant halleliyah in four-part harmony the lights came on, like moonlight, white and bo ft. Where is it? Oh, is that it? a spectator said. But it was sufficient cause for celebration at Bowling Green last Thursday. Look out.

Rockefeller Center theres another spectacular event that is going to give you some serious competition! proclaimed a press release for the lighting ceremony. In addition, a Christmas tree, a 55-foot balsam fir from Nackawic, New Brunswick, was lit in Bowling Green Park, across a plaza from the Custom House. Nackawic Mayor Steven P. Hawkes, who attended the building lighting and wore his chain of office, which looked like a metal garland, read holiday greetings from Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. Its like a dream to be in New York," he said during a champagne and cake party afterward.

Really, you dont know how proud I am to be here, seeing the Canadian flag and the American flag. City Parks Commissioner Heniy J. Stern, who wore a bright orange Parks Department lifeguard jacket, was also present. He was out of breath, having just rushed from the lighting of the City Hall Christmas tree. I am certain, he told the audience of about 150 people, that this tree matches it in beauty and in bulk.

The City Hall tree lighting was an older tradition, having been begun in 1975, Stern said. This was only the third year of a Christmas tree for Bowling Green. We have this ironic and unexplainable situation, said Arthur Piccolo, chairman and founder of the Bowling Green Association, a business organization in Lower Manhattan. Piccolo spearheaded efforts to have a Christmas tree and decorations at the historic park on the site where, it is said, Peter Minuit bought Manhattan from the Manhattoes for $24. The English fenced in the oval spot in 1732 for use by private citizens as a bowling ground, hence the name.

So Piccolo took it upon himself to start a new tradition in the historic spot. With the help of the Bowling Green Association, the first tree was lighted in 1985. The association also bought the lights for the U.S. Custom House building. Now we have Canadas Christmas gift to New York, and now we have lights on an important New York building, he said.

Up until 1986, the city did not do anything to celebrate Christmas in Bowling Green, Piccolo said. And to illustrate this stepchild status, he politely pointed out that the City Hall lighting took precedence over the Bowling Green lighting. This year, the honor of throwing the switch that sent voltage flowing to the Bowling Green tree went to Katya Landegger, daughter of George F. Landegger, who is a member of the Bowling Green Association. It happened that Katya Landegger turned 21 on last Thursday.

The seven-story U.S. Custom House, completed in 1907, was designed by Cass Gilbert. Its style is grand and ostentatious it has four statues in the front representing Asia, North America, Europe and Africa; masonry work of dolphins and scallop shells, and inside, a grand, egg-shaped rotunda with frescoes by artist Reginald Marsh. I call it the American Sistine Chapel, Piccolo said of the frescoes. But the building has been mostly empty two floors are used by the U.S.

Bankruptcy Court for the past 15 years. Piccolo said. Early this year. Sens. Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) promised to introduce legislation that would allow the American Indian Museum to move into the Custom House.

Piccolo said the building.could also be considered for use as a cultural arts center for nonprofit organizations in Lower Manhattan. This building was dark for years, Diamond said. If we have our way, were going to bring cultural arts use for this building. This is the finest Beaux Arts building in the country today. 1 3 cn 2 CD JO Ul ro I I i.