From the Vineyard Gazette edition of Sept. 7, 1945:

The sale of the S.M. Mayhew Company general store in West Tisbury was completed last week. Charles A. Turner, proprietor, turned the business over to Albion A. Alley, long his chief clerk, and thus the establishment, conducted in the same building and on the same site since 1858, changed hands for the third time in its history. The several proprietors, who have owned and operated the store were Nathan Mayhew, the founder, blacksmith and Forty-niner, his two sons, Sanderson M. and Ulysses E. Mayhew, who eventually succeeded him, Charles A. Turner and, now, Mr. Alley.

To the older folk of the Vineyard the store will continue to be known as “Sanderson’s” and, it will no doubt be pleasing to Mr. Alley to have all possible characteristics of his landmark preserved.

Longside the stove in Sanderson’s

The men who gather there today,

Will talk of fleeting time and change,

Adoption of the modern way.

No more the halters and the whips,

The milk pails and the lanterns

swing,

From blackened timbers overhead,

Or small boys, dangling cowbells

ring.

The coffee mill they used to turn,

The steel traps and the bars of lead,

For muzzle-loading shotgun loads

Are gone, or stored in outer shed.

But there the shelves stand, painted

new,

With scars of use that clearly show.

There are the hooks, forged by the

smith,

Where boots and pails hung long

ago.

These are the self-same planks

which jarred,

When stamped by feet of men

of old,

In hot debate around the stove.

Through old-time winters,

long and cold.

All these are here, as once they were,

When grandsires of these present

men

Were young and strong, who came

and went

To “Sanderson’s” and back again.

And thus it seems, though changed

the day,

Though paint and fixtures may

replace

The smoky walls and hanging gear,

As beard conceals a friendly face —

Yet underneath the features like,

The same old kindly face we know.

So must, unchanged be

“Sanderson”,

The same old store of long ago

Jose Viara of Vineyard Haven, better known as plain Joe, is putting the finishing touches on a 13-foot sharpie, in which he plans to go scalloping this fall. It is by no means the first such sharpie to be built in Vineyard Haven, nor is it even the first of its kind built by Mr. Viara, who is a well-known craftsman. But it is, very likely, the first boat to be built of yew, the wood of which old English bows was constructed.

Cedar and pine, those woods usually preferred for such uses, have been difficult to obtain since the war began, and the search by the boat-builder for such lumber was unavailable. But last fall’s hurricane had toppled some giant evergreens in one of the town’s cemeteries. One of these was a yew, and this Mr. Viara took to the sawmill, where it was made into suitable boards for boat-building.

It took the forms beautifully, as might be expected of bow-wood, and in appearance the grain slightly resembles cypress. In weight it is about the same as cedar, and altogether it seems very satisfactory indeed. If, therefore, anyone should see Señor Viara speeding like an arrow across Lagoon Pond, by and by, he will know that the old yew tree still possesses all its traditional characteristics.

The West Tisbury school opened Wednesday with Miss Helen O’Donnell of Bridgewater as teacher for the second year. Twenty-one pupils are enrolled and eight of these are children who are going to school for the first time. Entered in the first grade are Rita Alley, Shirley Burt, Joan Merry, Barbara Ann Morrill, Margaret Duquette, Walter Vincent, Margaret Wilkinson, and Robert Duarte.

Pupils from Lambert’s Cove, Indian Hill and Seven Gates Farm are being transported by Mrs. Raymond Cottle of Lambert’s Cove, and the pupils on the main road through North Tisbury to West Tisbury are being transported by Albertus S. Cahoon with the school bus. He stops for them on his return trip from transporting the upper grades and high school students to the Vineyard Haven school.

— Compiled by Alison L. Mead