Nature was hungry at the beginning of 2024.

The year opened with a severe storm battering the Island, the third in just over a month, each one turning its unwavering attention on the south shore, transforming Lucy Vincent Beach into a moonscape of rock, and Edgartown declaring a state of emergency after South Beach’s dunes were devoured.

To dredge or not to dredge, that was the question as towns debated the best way forward.

“If the biggest public beach on the Island were to suddenly be gone, that would be a big problem,” said Edgartown town administrator James Hagerty. “It’s a solid return on investment.”

Edgartown replenished, while up-Island towns decided to let nature take its course. In both cases, the beaches were restored by summer, with many seasonal visitors unaware of what had taken place in the off-season.

It was an inauspicious beginning to the year, portending perhaps more of the same during an El Niño Year, which often results in severe storms. The weather patterns relaxed as the year went on, but chaos reigned in other areas, along with passionate pleas to do something about the housing crisis, the flooding at Five Corners, ticks, traffic jams, big houses, the wealth gap and the general discord among political parties.

In short, when looking back, it was a year that reflected both the unique and the familiar, where infrastructure was stretched to the breaking point during the summer months, and the quiet of the offseason renewed and refreshed as it always does.

It was also a year where just getting to the Island by sea became a roll of the dice as the Steamship Authority repeatedly took it on the chin in 2024. A crisis of leadership charted a patchy course, and crew shortages and ferry breakdowns prompted last-minute schedule changes and breakdowns all year long.

There was grumbling in every corner and by year’s end general manager Robert Davis had announced his retirement and chief operating officer Mark Higgins abruptly resigned in November. Meanwhile, many a vacation began parked in the standby line.

And yet, when summed up — whether by weather or locomotion — both issues are byproducts of living on an island, which no matter how much the creature comforts of the modern age may propose the opposite, is by its very definition a land surrounded by water, which brings with it a certain degree of difficulty.

It also brings with it a heightened sense of community, which once again was on full display throughout 2024. MV Youth, the nonprofit aimed at helping Island youth, turned 10 years old this year. Thus far, the organization has given away over $18.8 million, thanks to 100 founders, each donating $100,000 or more. The Martha’s Vineyard Commission turned 50 years old, as did the West Tisbury Farmers’ Market and the Kids Trout Tournament.

The community also said goodbye in 2024 to far too many beloved Islanders, including two local men who spent their lives giving back to the Vineyard, each making their mark in unique ways.

Gus Ben David, a son of Oak Bluffs, died in July at the age of 81. Mr. Ben David became a world-renowned wildlife biologist from his perch running Felix Neck and later down the road at his home which doubled as the World of Reptiles and Birds Park.

“He shared his love of the world with anyone who listened,” said granddaughter Lilian Borges at the memorial service for Mr. Ben David. “He could talk for hours about the birds and turtles and just the nature of the world.”

The month before, Ronald Rappaport, an attorney who grew up in Oak Bluffs and returned to the Island after law school, died suddenly at the age of 74. Mr. Rappaport was a ubiquitous figure in every corner of the Island, from town meetings and select boards to summer soirees. He was also a familiar sight along the roadways, his halo of unruly curly hair blossoming from beneath his bike helmet like a beacon of hope on two wheels, as he traversed the Island he loved on early morning rides.

“It’s hard to imagine a more influential person on the Island,” said Jim Swartz at the time of Mr. Rappaport’s death. “He was behind the scenes on everything. We won’t see the scope of a Ron Rappaport ever again.”

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The newest Islander arrived on Jan. 1. Cameron Snow Godbout was born at 9:04 p.m. to parents Kayla Snow and Eric Godbout. He weighed in at 6 pounds, 10.7 ounces and was also welcomed by eight-year old big brother, Charlie.

“We’ve been joking that he’s already famous,” Ms. Snow said.

Celebrity status conferred, the next chapter of Cameron’s story will have to wait as other matters took center stage throughout the year.

A whale of a tale emerged in late January, when a dead right whale washed up on the shore at Cow Bay in Edgartown. The 20,000-pound young female represented yet another blow to the endangered species, but also a scientific opportunity as the carcass was mostly intact, and a chance to honor its life with a tribal burial on Wampanoag land in Aquinnah.

The whale was towed by sea from Edgartown to Vineyard Haven, and then by truck to Aquinnah, an undertaking that required a team as large as the whale itself.

“It’s a matter of respect and also upholding the rights of us as Indigenous people in how we treat the passing of relatives, especially something that’s as significant as whales,” said Cheryl Andrews-Maltais, chairwoman of the Aquinnah Tribal Council.

Further out to sea, the wind power industry faced a severe setback. After years of facing backlash from fishermen and some conservationists who feared such a large sea venture would hurt whales, birds, the lobster and fishing industries, among other issues, the wind farms appeared on the horizon as if overnight and began generating power.

In July, however, the party was put on pause.

Just a few weeks after Vineyard Wind declared itself the largest offshore wind farm in the country, one of the blades broke off, spilling debris into the ocean, which later washed up on Vineyard and Nantucket beaches.

The blades run the length of a football field and the early setback renewed calls to slow down on the rush to wind power, and resulted in months of investigation and a shutdown of sending power from the windmills to the grid. By the end of year, the turbines were under construction again, but by then the industry was worried about a new potential setback as President Donald Trump, who won reelection in November, has often spoken out against wind power. During his campaign, he even threatened to halt the industry on “day one” of his presidency.

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In the schools, the near-decade long debate over whether to install an artificial turf field at the regional high school ended as abruptly as a fourth-quarter whistle being blown.

Over the years, the issue became a lightning rod for two camps: those who wanted to build an artificial turf field and those who wanted to improve the grass fields. Both sides agreed that the current fields were in need of repair, but how to go about fixing the issue inflamed and provoked as one side cited statistics that showed turf fields were safe and better for the athletes, while the other side gathered environmental data to detail the potential negative consequences and possibly cancer-causing effects of long-lasting chemicals known as PFAS in turf fields.

Early in the year, school principal Sara Dingledy weighed in after keeping silent about the matter for years. Ms. Dingledy said the issue was dividing the community and could risk state funding for a new high school.

“It does me no good as a leader to align myself in a struggle that’s divisive for the Island,” Ms. Dingledy said. “However, right now we find ourselves with continued litigation and maneuvering that does not yet feel collaborative.”

In February, the school committee voted to scrap the turf field plan, and in April the Oak Bluffs board of health banned the installation of artificial turf playing surfaces in town.

Attention then turned to a new school, with the price tag for either renovating the existing school or building an entirely new one landing in the range of $223 to $427 million. Those figures were presented in October by Tappé Architects, the firm charged with creating the conceptual designs. The project remains in the planning stages, and more than a third of most expenses will be potentially reimbursed through the Massachusetts School Building Authority.

On the sports fields, two away games received the most press as the boys basketball team played Nantucket at TD Garden and the football team competed in the Island Cup at Fenway Park.

In both contests the sister island was victorious, but by all accounts the experience of playing on such hallowed grounds more than outweighed the sting of defeat.

Also in the schools, it was a game of musical chairs as several Island principals retired. In April, Edgartown school principal Shelley Einbinder-Fleischmann announced it would be her last year leading the school, Susan Stevens retired this year as leader of the Chilmark School after 49 years in education, and Megan Farrell ended her run at the Oak Bluffs School. Ms. Farrell was then chosen to be the assistant superintendent of schools, while vice principal of the regional high school Jeremy Light took over leadership of the Oak Bluffs School.

Kate Squire from Concord took the helm of the Chilmark School and John Stevens came out of retirement to become interim principal at the Edgartown School.

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It was a presidential election year, a solar eclipse year, and the year the Vineyard Gazette welcomed a new publisher to lead the 178-year-old broadsheet. Monica Brady-Myerov took over from Jane Seagrave, who had led the paper since 2011. Ms. Brady-Myerov is only the 11th publisher in the history of the Gazette, its first issue rolling off the press on May 14, 1846 under the watchful eye of Edgar Marchant.

The Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby turned 79 in 2024, and was won by a newcomer to the tradition. Carmelo Torres took home the grand prize boat after entering the derby for the first time. Mr. Torres moved to the Vineyard just a few months earlier to take care of a friend’s mother who was ill. He drew the winning key at the awards ceremony for his 8.13-pound bonito.

“This is the stuff of a movie,” Mr. Torres said, in tears at the event. “I’m just a kid from Allentown, Pennsylvania. Coming from where I come from, this means a lot.”

In May, an off-Island rampage shocked the Island, as Jared Ravizza, who called Chilmark home for awhile, was arrested off-Island for murder in Connecticut and a stabbing spree at a movie theatre and McDonald’s in Massachusetts.

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This summer, the Beach Road Weekend festival called it quits much to the dismay of Island music lovers, and a Chilmark home was listed to rent at the cost of $1 million for four weeks.

At the end of July, the Island celebrated along with the entire country the release of Paul Whelan, who had been held captive for five years by the Russian government. Mr. Whelan is the brother of Vineyard artist Elizabeth Whelan, who with her family had been advocating for his release. Mr. Whelan was part of a prisoner exchange alongside two other American citizens, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich.

“It meant the world to me, to see Paul come down those steps and to know that he was finally free from this horrific experience in Russia,” Ms. Whelan told the Gazette.

In November, the nation elected Donald Trump to lead the country. Closer to home, Thomas Moakley won the Vineyard’s state representative seat, taking over from Dylan Fernandes, who won a spot in the state senate, representing Plymouth and Barnstable counties. Julian Cyr cruised to victory as the incumbent senate representative for the Cape and Islands.

The solar eclipse was an opportunity to slow down on an otherwise normal busy summer day and don protective glasses to stare up at the heavens. For a nation often divided, it was a moment of pure consensus and awe, as the community gathered at libraries, schools, on Main streets, beaches and backyards.

Chris Stam and Marina Solovykh chose to get married at the height of the eclipse, at 3:20 p.m. when skies went dark and the temperatures dropped more than 15 degrees.

“It’s a once in a lifetime experience and we wouldn’t trade it for anything else,” Ms. Solovykh said after the ceremony at town hall in Edgartown.

At the hospital, baby Oliver Hulka decided it was time to arrive at peak eclipse, putting him on par, perhaps, with the New Year’s baby as far as newborn celebrities go. Oliver was welcomed into the world at 3:33 p.m. by parents Maria and Jan Hulka.

“I looked out at the sky and saw the outside light had gone away,” Ms. Hulka said. “And then I don’t remember anything else. I was busy.”

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Ticks and the diseases they spread were often in the news in 2024, but this year the tale took a bizarre turn more fitting for a science fiction movie. Alpha-gal became a household word as dinner parties and restaurants now have to contend with a growing population who can no longer eat red meat and other mammal products. The allergy is spread by lone star ticks, a relative newcomer to these shores, gaining a foothold initially on Chappaquiddick before roaming everywhere with impunity.

These ticks actually hunt down their prey, which includes humans, unlike dog and deer ticks, which must lie in wait in the underbrush. They are fast moving and multiply quickly. Some Islanders got an up-close look at just how quickly after encountering a large cluster of tick larva referred to as a “tick bomb.”

An alpha-gal support group popped up as recipients dealt with the allergy, the severity of which depends on the person’s tolerance. Some can not handle even wearing a leather belt without getting a rash, while others merely feel nauseous after eating red meat.

In other tick-related news, the list of suspects spreading Lyme disease abruptly shifted this year, when scientists discovered that the mysterious shrew might be public enemy number one as opposed to the white-footed mouse, which had long been considered the main culprit.

While the mouse is still in the house, so to speak, the introduction of shrews to the mix brings with it the need for a whole new expanse of research. Shrews are a more frenetic species, constantly on the hunt for food and hard to trap.

“We are starting from scratch again,” said Heidi Goethert, a scientist at Tufts University and the leader of the study. “We need to change and tailor our more targeted interventions.”

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The Manuel F. Correllus State Forest became the site of a few controversies this year, as state and local officials clashed over issues at the 5,300-acre preserve.

In late July, the Department of Conservation and Recreation cleared three homeless encampments in the state forest without first informing Island police departments, county officials or aid groups. Caseworkers and volunteers were left scrambling to find housing for those affected, and deal with the aftermath of people’s personal documents and supplies being tossed away like garbage.

“They took everything — birth certificates, I.D., medication, everything,” said Sharon Brown, the director of homeless services for Harbor Homes.

The state also made waves this fall when it floated a plan to clear cut the white pine trees in the forest, calling them an invasive species that posed a fire hazard to the forest.

Local environmental scientists quickly pushed back.

“It’s hard to describe it as anything other than environmental disaster,” said David Foster, a local ecologist and former director of Harvard Forest.

The state has promised better communication going forward and has held public meetings on the Island. The state delegation got an earful at one such event, soon after the homeless encampment was destroyed. Naomi Higgins, a resident of the forest encampment before it was razed, talked openly about the damage it caused to her and others in the forest.

“The people in the forest are electricians, mathematicians, nurses at hospitals and schools on this Island whose names I will not speak, because their anonymity is everything to them,” Ms. Higgins told the officials.

That there are homeless on the Vineyard, a place that has become synonymous with wealth, celebrity and a supposed endless expanse of privileged vacation vibes, is not a new issue for those on the front lines. But for decades it has lingered on the fringes, often referred to as the “Vineyard shuffle,” a more adventurous sounding name than its reality, where essential workers live in their cars, the forest, or 20 to an apartment during the summer months in order to get by after being replaced from seasonal rentals by higher-rent paying tourists.

In 2024, as in previous years, the crisis kept growing. Although numerous Island organizations, such as the Island Housing Trust and others have been instrumental in creating affordable housing, there is no quick fix. The reverberations are everywhere, as many business owners must now purchase homes to house their employees, becoming both boss and landlord in the process.

And the fact that Harbor Homes, the Island’s homeless shelter, is itself looking for a home remains a particular irony. For the past three years Harbor Homes, which also operates two group homes for low-income Islanders, has run its shelter in a building on the Martha’s Vineyard Community Services campus. After this season, however, the organization will need to find a new space, as Community Services renovates its campus.

Island Grown Initiative and the Food Pantry also continue to help Islanders facing food insecurity, and in October the pantry celebrated the opening of its new facility on Dukes County avenue in Oak Bluffs.

The rise in rents has also depleted key services on the Island. Following a trend that started in 2023, the stock of Island veterinarians continued to dwindle in 2024. Dr. Constance Breese, a Vineyard Haven veterinarian of 40 years, closed her Sea Breeze Veterinary Service in April, leaving the Island with just four veterinarians. One of those, Animal Health Care Associates, faced an uncertain future when its 40-year lease at the Martha’s Vineyard Airport property ended this year and had to be renegotiated. In the end, Animal Health Care and the airport worked things out, but the crisis of animal doctors continues.

The Vineyard lost another auto mechanic as Andrea Dello Russo, the owner of Andrea’s Auto in Edgartown, closed her shop. Ms. Dello Russo said she could no longer afford a place to live on the Vineyard.

“It’s really breaking my heart,” Ms. Dello Russo said, as she prepared for a new chapter in Oregon. “It’s a lot to pack everything up and leave and feel the hole in the community that I will be leaving.”

At the end of September, Leslie’s Pharmacy, a fixture on Main street Vineyard Haven going back more than seven decades, closed its doors.

“We tried our best to continue on, but the time has come for us to say goodbye,” the pharmacy owners wrote in a Facebook post. “We can’t thank our customers and Island community enough for all the support over the years since we bought the business in 2003. Our family has truly enjoyed serving our community.”

With Leslie’s closing, only three pharmacies remain on the Island: Vineyard Scripts in Vineyard Haven, Conroy Apothecary in West Tisbury and Stop & Shop Pharmacy in Edgartown.

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Despite the ups and downs of the year, the Island continued to thrum as a place where creative juices often flow to the fullest. Year-round and seasonal talent excelled in the arts as authors, painters, musicians and more broke new ground.

Frequent summer visitor Percival Everett won the National Book award for his novel James, Roger Bart was nominated for his third Tony award for his role as Doc Brown in the Broadway production of Back to the Future, and Suzanne de Passe was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the recipient of the Ahmet Ertegun Award.

Joan Nathan published an acclaimed memoir My Life in Recipes, Karen Allen stopped by the Vineyard Drive-In to talk about her starring role in Raiders of the Lost Ark, Billy Balloo and Miss Maybelline returned to sold-out runs at the Vineyard Playhouse and Claudia Taylor was named the Island’s poet laureate.

The regional high school performed Twelfth Night in its annual February production, and in the nexus of arts meets cultural phenomenon category, the coming Jaws anniversary began to percolate. The 50th anniversary of the movie’s release is in 2025, but 2024 marked 50 years from the book’s publication and the filming of the movie on the Vineyard.

Susan Murphy, who with her husband Lynn Murphy helped tow the mechanical shark known as Bruce during filming in 1974, recalled those days.

“None of us working on the movie had any idea in the world that it was going to be as big as it was,” Ms. Murphy said. “For most of us, it was the very first movie we really had anything to do with.”

Ms. Murphy died a week after her interview with the Gazette, but her story will continue to live on, as will the stories of all the Vineyarders the community sadly said goodbye to this year, including, but not limited to: Rez Williams, Ginny Jones, Janice Haynes, Ron Rappaport, Gus Ben David, Bob Moore, Janet Messineo. Abigail McGrath, Jim Norton, Jack Knower, Sidney Morris, Lucy Cox, Bob Daniels, Delores Stevens, JB Riggs Parker and Mary Jo Reston.

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When chronicling the highlights of a year gone by, it is easy to look past the mundane and familiar, but that is a mistake. A look back reveals so much more than a top-ten list of highs and lows, and yet often the walk in the woods, a sunrise beheld on the shoreline or meal shared in the company of friends gets overlooked.

And yet taken as a whole, a year is made up of stories large, small and in-between. It is a measure of time and the people one shares that time with, those who choose to call this Island home, be they year-rounder, seasonal or just visiting for the day.

Perhaps then, as the gaze looks ahead to 2025, the last word of 2024 is best given over to Mr. Ben David, who summed up his teaching philosophy this way: “I teach kids about nature but people assume I want them all to grow up and be naturalists. But I don’t care whether they grow up to be lawyers or doctors. I do care that they grow up to be caring, compassionate individuals.”

More pictures.