Queens Name Explorer logo
Queens Name Explorer
Rory Staunton Field
2025

Photo by David Engelman, 2025

Rory Staunton (1999-2012) was a young resident of Sunnyside Gardens and a student at the Garden School in Jackson Heights who was known for his civic responsibility, inspiring leadership and kind heart. A member of the Garden School's student council, he led the "Spread the Word to End the Word" campaign to discourage the use of the term “retarded.” Staunton tragically died of sepsis after a minor sports injury at the age of 12. Following his death, the Staunton family founded the End Sepsis organization to increase sepsis awareness and advocate for mandatory sepsis protocols in hospitals.

Sources:

"Rory Staunton Field," New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, accessed February 22, 2023, https://www.nycgovparks.org/parks/rory-stanton-field

Jim Dwyer, "An Infection, Unnoticed, Turns Unstoppable," The New York Times, July 11, 2012, https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/12/nyregion/in-rory-stauntons-fight-for-his-life-signs-that-went-unheeded.html

End Sepsis: The Legacy of Rory Staunton, accessed February 22, 2023, https://www.endsepsis.org/

Related Lists

Queens Street Name Stories iconQueens Street Name Stories

Queens Street Name Stories is an oral history and audio documentary project based in the Corona, Jackson Heights and East Elmhurst neighborhoods of Queens, New York. It tells the personal stories behind local place names through interviews with family, friends and colleagues of local residents who were honored with a public space named after them posthumously. Click Here to Listen to Queens Street Name Stories Oral Histories! Queens Street Name Stories is a collaborative project of the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY‘s NYCity News Service and the Queens Memory Project at Queens Public Library.