AROUND the turn of the last century, Morris Park in the East Bronx was a pretty lively place to be. From 1889 to 1904, the neighborhood was home to the 300-plus-acre Morris Park Racecourse, home for a few thrilling years to both the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes.

Women in flowing gowns and men in derbies or boaters arrived by horse and buggy or via the New Haven Railroad, which built a special spur to the neighborhood. In subsequent years, the track was used for auto racing and what was touted as the first public air show.

The thoroughbreds, fast cars and flying daredevils are just a memory, thanks to a fire that in 1910 destroyed virtually all traces of the racecourse. But to Tom Vasti, a retired police officer who has lived in Morris Park nearly his entire life, the past is present daily, and in all its glory.

Mr. Vasti’s grandparents were Italian immigrants, “part of the generation that believed the streets were paved with gold,” he said. His parents were married in 1949, and Tom, their only child, was born the following year.