The Chappy ferry will begin operating on the summer schedule on the Thursday before Memorial Day weekend. That date is May 23 this year. On the summer schedule, the ferry operates continuously from 6:45 a.m. through midnight, weather permitting.

The Chappy Store, aka Jerry’s Place, will open for the season also on that Thursday before Memorial Day weekend. They will be open weekends until mid-June.

The Edgartown Board of Selectmen will hold a public hearing on Monday, May 6 at 4:10 p.m. to address the request of Chappaquiddick Ferry, Inc. to increase the base cash fare on the Chappy Ferry for a vehicle and driver round trip from $12 to $13. The hearing will be held in the Fred B. Morgan Jr. Meeting Room of Town Hall, 70 Main St., Edgartown. The public is encouraged to attend or send comment to: PO Box 5158, Edgartown MA 02539 or selectmen@edgartown- ma.us.

Many Chappaquiddickers knew the late Tommy Rogers. His company Katama Construction dug many foundation holes, installed many septic systems and made many dirt driveways and roads passable in mud season. To my knowledge he never owned an excavator. He accomplished all of his earth moving feats with a medium sized backhoe and a rubber tired front end loader. This was at a time when excavators were considered essential. Tommy said they were a waste of money and that a smart guy like he was could out dig one anyway.

During the time that he lived on Chappy I got to see him nearly daily. I always called him by his formal name, Thomas. In return he called me by what he figured would be mine, Pietro. He usually showed his gruff exterior, but I know that he did some big favors for people. He enjoyed self-righteous indignation as much as any of us do, but he also was willing to recognize, occasionally, begrudgingly, that he was sort of wrong.

While working for Vineyard Land Surveying way back when, my field crew and I were placing stakes to indicate the corners of a foundation in a big hole that Tommy and Hughie MacInnis had dug up on the high bluffs at North Neck. One end of the hole hadn’t gone far enough and we stuck the stakes in the sloping sandy wall of the hole to show Tommy how much farther he needed to dig. When he saw that, he climbed down from the loader, strode over to me and insisted vehemently that I must have staked it out wrong before he started digging. I suggested that we go back up to the surface and check the row of stakes that we had put in for him to guide him once he started digging. Sure enough, they were all still there in a nice straight line. It was clear that he needed to go another several feet. He mumbled a couple of swear words, took his cigar out of his mouth and said: “How could I see these stakes from down there? Well Pietro, I guess I better start digging.” I took those words to be a very heart-felt apology from Tommy.

One summer sunrise down on the waterfront, after he had camped out in the handicap parking space overnight, I walked over to say good morning. We got to talking about boats. He asked if I knew that he had been in the Coast Guard. He took out his wallet. Right behind his driver’s license was his United States Coast Guard identification card. It was a photo ID of course. It showed a wide-eyed baby-faced teenager with a look of surprise on his face, but the distinct Rogers facial features were there. From then on, whenever I saw Tommy, rather than an irritated old guy with a chip on his shoulder in the twilight of his life, I saw that young man in the photo.