Editor, Vineyard Gazette;

I want to give a salute and huge shout out to Mr. James Hagerty (Lieut. Col.), the town administrator for the town of Edgartown.

My wife Phyllis and I drove along Atlantic Drive at South Beach last weekend to look at the finished product of all the total damage Mother Earth and her storms did to the beach, the dunes and the road.

I grew up in Edgartown on Katama Road. As a kid our lives circled around South Beach and the bunker. We used to be able to sleep on the beach at night in the summer with no problems or permits, have giant bonfires, beach parties, and we all learned how to swim in those crazy, strong currents and waves.

Many of us as kids learned how to march in formation along Atlantic Drive, back and forth from left to right forks when we were in the Edgartown Boys Club Drum and Bugle Corps. George Luce taught us all how to play the drums and bugles and we played in every parade, in uniforms held in Edgartown for as long as I can remember. Actually, George teaching us how to honorably march in formation was totally invaluable to me when I joined the US Marine Corps in 1969 at Parris Island.

In 1969, when we graduated from MVRHS, our class picture was taken while we sat and stood on top of the bunker for the inside cover of our graduation yearbook. In fact, when we had our 50th reunion we all met at where the bunker once stood at the beach. We were given an aerial picture taken by the US Coast Guard of where the bunker is now which is over 400 feet out to sea and could be clearly seen from above.

Phyllis and I went there after the last storm and everything was closed off and we took pictures of the destruction.

After two plus months it was reported that everything was finally repaired — the dunes, the beach and Atlantic Drive — so we went up to see and take pictures and videos. To our absolute total amazement we witnessed the beautiful, miraculous finished product.

That two-plus month impossible mission could only have been proudly accomplished by an Island native son who honorably left the Island after graduation, joined the Marines becoming a officer, went to war and returned to our Island after honorably serving our country and becoming the new town administrator of Edgartown.

It is a perfect example of another Island native growing up here, coming from a military background, returning to the Island he loved, married a talented and beautiful wife and is now raising two wonderful children in Edgartown.

I salute you my fellow Marine, my Island native brother. You have made all of us proud as you continue to serve our country and our Island.

Semper Fi

Woody and Phyllis Williams
Vineyard Haven