Dylan Thomas
The birds of the winged trees flying my name Above the farms and the white horses I rose in rainy autumn And walked abroad in a shower of all my days. – Dylan Thomas
June 13, 2008
Annual Town Meeting Resumes in Aquinnah; Quorum Crucial
Interrupted for lack of a quorum, the Aquinnah annual town meeting will continue on June 19 — and assuming enough voters turn out this time — the town will take up the first townwide bylaw on the Vineyard to regulate energy use. Lengthy, detailed and focusing almost exclusively on wind turbines, the bylaw is the…
Tisbury School Students Achieve Academic Honors
The following Tisbury School students received honors for the third quarter: Sixth Grade High Honors: Callie Jackson, Emily Medeiros, Jacqueline Menton and Barra Peak. Sixth Grade Honors: Gabe Bergeron, Taymon Brown, Isabella Canham, Aaron Figueroa, Nathaniel Horwitz, Lorrane Menezes, Shane Metters, Jade Pine, Goncalo Rego, Gabrielle Silva, Kyle Stobie, Jennifer Tripp and Kristina Ward,
The Vineyard Gardener
By LYNNE IRONS Don Brown is a marketing genius. There is a gorgeous Golden Rain Tree in North Tisbury. Don put a large number of them for sale along the road at the newly reconstituted Middletown Nursery. I practically wrecked the truck pulling in for a walk-about. There are some interesting plants for sale and…
Geology and Scenery
Geology and Scenery Longtime Chilmark summer resident Conrad Neumann will present a free program titled Geology and Scenery on Land and Sea at the Chilmark Public Library on Thursday, June 19, from 5 to 6 p.m. Mr. Neumann, who lives in Chapel Hill, N.C. in the winter, taught geology and oceanography at the University of…
Look What’s Come to Light: Beacons Open for Challenge
Martha’s Vineyard is privileged to have five lighthouses on its shores and a sixth at the Martha’s Vineyard Museum campus in Edgartown. Two more afar can be seen from the Island, sometimes even more at night. This weekend all the Island’s lighthouses will be celebrated in what is being called the Martha’s Vineyard Lighthouse Challenge.…
Walking Long Hours: Relay for Life Helps Raise Needed Funds
When the American Cancer Society’s fifth annual Relay for Life begins this afternoon, more than 400 walkers will take over the track at the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School in Oak Bluffs to support patients in treatment for cancer, survivors of the disease and to honor the memory of those lost along the way.
Exchange Student Program Seeks Area Host Families
Exchange Student Program Seeks Area Host Families The Academic Foundation for International Cultural Exchange is seeking community representatives and host families for the organization. Community representatives find host families for cultural exchange students and work with these students during the schoolyear. Representatives must enjoy working with teenagers and have good communication skills.
Sneezing Season
I have been very blessed lately, and I bet that you have been too. It is not an epidemic of good fortune, but rather an overabundance of pollen that has brought all of those “bless you’s” in response to the seemingly never-ending supply of sneezes.
Chapter Four: Of Abe and Mr. Moby
In this serialized novel set on the Vineyard in real time, a native Islander (“Call me Becca”) returns home to the Vineyard after many years in Manhattan. Her uncle Abe has been dumped by his wife Gwen, and Abe requires assistance to keep their landscaping business, Pequot, afloat. In the first few chapters, Becca reacquainted…
Beside Long Shadow of his Grandfather, Artist Anthony Benton Gude Comes Home
Anthony Benton Gude was 21 before he realized he could paint for a living. He was working construction jobs at the time and in retrospect there were already hints. “If we had to re-plaster I always mixed the paints,” he said, “and if we needed a rendering, I did that.” But it wasn’t until his…
Tisbury School Fifth Graders Visit State House
Twenty-seven Tisbury School 5th grade students visited the Massachusetts State House on Beacon Hill in Boston on June 4. The class was invited by Nell Coogan, herself a former Tisbury School student. Ms. Coogan, who lives in Oak Bluffs and Boston, works as associate counsel to the state Senate Ways and Means Committee. Along with…
Wash Day Art
Wash Day Art As the green movement has grown, hanging out clothes has become de rigueur. Solar dryers, some call them, but around here they are still known as clotheslines, and on the Island they never really went out of style, except possibly with the emerging trophy house crowd who live in climate-controlled homes where…
Island Rejoyces With Bloomsday Show
Arts & Society presents the 30th annual Bloomsday celebration of music and drama based on the text of James Joyce, on June 16, at 8 p.m. at the Katharine Cornell Theatre, Spring street, Vineyard Haven. Tickets are $18 general, $15 senior and student, and may be purchased at the door or at the Bunch of…
Gourmet Stroll Feeds the Care of Island’s Past
The question on everyone’s lips was not who are you wearing, but what are you eating? They were dressed to kill in the highest of heels and long strings of pearls; gussied up in bow ties and Ferragamo shoes. But last night, at the Martha’s Vineyard Preservation Trust’s 23rd annual Taste of the Vineyard Gourmet…
Board Proposes Wastewater Management Plan for Vineyard
A subcommittee of the Martha’s Vineyard Commission on Wednesday launched an ambitious plan to create an Islandwide wastewater management study, which among other things is expected to call for a more regional approach to sewage treatment and the reduction of nitrogen loading into coastal ponds. The Water Resource Work Group — a subset of the…
Temperatures
Temperature: Precip. Day Max. Min. Inches. Fº Fº June 6 58 54 .04 June 7 62 53 Trace June 8 80 61 .00 June 9 88 70 .00 June 10 91 63 .00 June 11 85 64 .00 June 12 87 64 .00
Water temperature in Edgartown harbor: 70º F.
About a Boy, a Boat, and a Love of All Things Old and Wooden
SLOOP: Restoring My Family’s Wooden Sailboat, An Adventure in Old-Fashioned Values. By Daniel Robb. Simon & Schuster, New York, N.Y. 2007. 318 pages with photographs. $25.
Taste of Tuesday
Good morning! The Gazette carries complete coverage of Taste of the Vineyard plus news and photographs from weekend events. Read it on Tuesday.
College Students from Island Graduate, Receive Honors
Students Graduate Hanss Buder, son of Lynn and Karl Buder of Vineyard Haven, has graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in political science from Duke University in Durham, N.C.
Mickaela Gray of Edgartown received a bachelor’s degree during May commencement ceremonies at the University of Vermont in Burlington, Vt. She majored…
Early Service
Early Service From June through August, the Federated Church on South Summer street in Edgartown will hold an early, informal service at 8 a.m. each Sunday. The service generally will last about 30 to 40minutes. The regular worship service will be held at 10:30 a.m., with child care available at this ser vice. More information…
Etiquette Class, Please
Etiquette Class, Please Certified etiquette teacher Elaine C. Carroll is offering children’s etiquette classes. Her East Coast School of Etiquette program opens at Farm Neck Golf Club in Oak Bluffs on June 30, teaching children from 3:15 to 4:40 p.m., three days a week for two weeks. A graduate of the American School of Protocol…
Movie About Lyme Disease Draws Criticism on Vineyard
In 2002, Kris Newby and her husband spent a week at their friend’s place in Chilmark. They had been warned about ticks and checked themselves every day of their stay. Though they didn’t find any ticks on themselves they both fell ill within weeks of their return to their home in California. One year and…
Red Cross Receives Grant
Red Cross Receives Grant The Edward Bangs and Elza Bangs Kelley Foundation Inc. has provided a $7,500 grant to the Cape Cod and Islands Chapter of the American Red Cross to support the Training For Life Program. The program is aimed at developing American Red Cross community scholarships to train high school students in first…
Democratic Council Will Sponsor Candidates ’ Event
Democratic Council Will Sponsor Candidates’ Event Candidates for the Democratic nomination for state representative to replace the retiring Rep. Eric T. Turkington will introduce themselves on June 29 from 4 to 6 p.m. at the Oak Bluffs School. The Democratic Council of Martha’s Vineyard, which is sponsoring the event, invites the public to meet…
Celebrate Freedom with Juneteenth Party
All are welcome to celebrate Juneteenth — an African American celebration of when all slaves were freed — on Saturday, June 14, at the Oak Bluffs School from 2 to 4 p.m. Although the Emancipation Proclamation was signed in 1863, the slaves in Texas were not notified of their freedom for another two years. This…
Correction
Correction The Farm and Field column in Tuesday’s Gazette gave the wrong location of Joel Salatin’s Polyface Farm. The farm is in Virginia. The Gazette regrets the error.
Rev. Thomas C. Lopes Plans Island Retirement
The Rev. Thomas C. Lopes, a Vineyard native who has been ordained for 43 years, will retire as pastor of Immaculate Conception Parish, North Easton, on June 24. Father Lopes, who will turn 70 in August, plans to retire to the Island. He intends to assist at churches in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Fall…
Chappy
MARGARET KNIGHT 508-627-8894 (margaret02539@yahoo.com) Jenna Zadeh, back home after graduating from Westfield State with a degree in music education, found herself in charge of an unexpected group of young ones on Sunday. When she went out that evening, she saw four baby skunks roaming as a pack around her yard.
As Polaroid Film Disappears, Jhenn Watts Develops Her Art
They are few but passionate, and Jhenn Watts is one of them: artists who create fine art photographic images, ironically, using good old Polaroid film. Because of its simplicity and ease of use, the basic Polaroid process was an instant success in the mid 20th century, recording America’s birthdays, graduations and cookouts. Point, click and…
Second Night Sought by Pops Festival
Festival Network, the national company that plans to hold a concert this summer in Ocean Park featuring the Boston Pops, wound up in hot water with Oak Bluffs selectmen this week when a representative asked for permission to expand the concert to a second night. The request from Rob Scherer drew heat from representatives of…
Mosquito Survey
Mosquito Survey A joint effort is planned for the Vineyard in July, August and part of September to trap and collect mosquitoes that may be vectors for Eastern Equine Encephalitis and West Nile Virus. The Island boards of health, Dukes County, the state Bureau of Laboratory and Enviromental Science, and the Massachusetts State Laboratory Institute…
Edgartown
KATHIE CASE 508-627-5349 (kathleencase@comcast.net) We’re having a heat wave — a tropical heat wave. I figure the only thing you can do when the weather is this hot is grin, bear it and sing. It is cooling down some now, but if this is the beginning of summer, then I think we need a bigger…
Talk to Explain Nantucket Bay Scallop Management
Nantucket’s rich history of bay scallop fisheries includes both commercial and family scalloping seasons. On Wednesday, guest speaker Dr. Robert Kennedy will detail the latest research into this fishery, in a free talk at Chilmark Public Library. He will summarize of the history of the bay scallop and scalloping on Nantucket, outline past and present…
Katie Mayhew Will Sing With Pops on Wednesday
Katie Mayhew, 16, of West Tisbury will perform with the Boston Pops on Wednesday, June 18, at Symphony Hall. The Pops will be conducted by Keith Lockhart. Broadway star Brian Stokes Mitchell will perform the same evening. Katie is one of six semi-finalists in the Pops High School Sing-Off. She will sing Being Alive, a…
The Cost of Wind
The Cost of Wind At a time when sharply rising oil prices are rippling through the economy — pushing up the price of a multitude of commodities, from gasoline to meat to electricity — the idea of generating power right in the backyard through renewable sources such as the wind grows even more attractive for…
Jenney Way Receives Environmental Honor
Jenney Way Receives Environmental Honor Four houses at Jenney Way in Edgartown recently received a top environmental designation from the U.S. Green Building Council. The council certified the houses at the platinum level of its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED, program. They became the first single-family affordable housing with permanent price protection…
Shell Games: Oyster Shucking Contest Boosts Housing Fund
Between heats at Nancy’s Snack Bar in Oak Bluffs on Saturday Jon Holden, last year’s winner of the Martha’s Vineyard annual oyster shucking contest, inspected his knife doubtfully. “I hate this knife,” he said, peering through his aviator shades at the black-handled Oxo brand shucker, “I wish I never bought it.”
Cross-Island Hike: A Long, Winding Trail
His feet were sore. His toes and heels threatened to blister. They had taken him across ponds, through wetlands and tall grass, under the cover of pines and oaks, over soft moss and hard asphalt, around the bends, down the valleys and up the hills.
Small But Mighty
Small But Mighty The piping plover is an amazing profile of endurance, hardiness, fidelity and overcoming long odds for survival. These tiny shorebirds mate for life and migrate north for thousands of miles every year to build their nests, which are literally scrapes in the sand. They are especially attracted to wide-open barrier beaches that…
Commission Examines Need To Better Enforce Conditions
In the face of mounting evidence that the conditions for approval for various development projects around the Island are routinely being ignored, the Martha’s Vineyard Commission has appointed a special committee to look into the issue and possibly draft new rules for enforcement. The commission has no enforcement officer to ensure the conditions for all…
Quiet, Please? Young Rockers Play With Libraries’ Old Image
The word library comes to us from the Latin librarius , meaning of, or relating to, books. But anyone visiting the Oak Bluffs Public Library on a Thursday afternoon might find such a definition sorely outdated.
To Cull Pesky Canada Geese, Oak Bluffs Tries Addling Eggs
A recent project in Oak Bluffs to cull the population of Canada geese by addling their eggs has been completed. Town shellfish and environmental officials hope the project will reduce droppings on public greens, including Ocean Park, and reduce bacteria levels in coastal ponds, including Sengekontacket and Farm Pond.
Letters to the Editor
STARTING SMALL Editors, Vineyard Gazette: When passing by the row of pitch pines along State Road at the Polly Hill Arboretum, I often notice their picturesque beauty that represents the Vineyard sense of place. I enjoy knowing these trees were planted as seedlings purchased in 1929 for 10 cents each. Though I don’t know the…
Professor Will Discuss History of Stone Walls
Robert Thorson, professor of geology at the University of Connecticut, will speak on Saturday, June 14 from 10 a.m. to noon at the Polly Hill Arboretum in West Tisbury on the cultural and environmental history of stone walls. From rugged coastline, granite ledges, and lichen-covered glacial boulders to the signature stone walls that ribbon our…
June 6: Rain in the Morning
Friday, June 6: Rain in the morning. Clearing skies. Warm. Fog settles over the Vineyard at night. The low dark sound of the Nobska Light foghorn can be heard from Oak Bluffs to Vineyard Haven late at night. Saturday, June 7: Sunny. Soil is turned over by tractor at Morning Glory Farm. The soil smells…
Friday Conversation
Friday Conversation William O’Brien, chairman of the Dukes County Charter Study Commission, will speak in the Friday Conversations program at the Oak Bluffs Senior Center from 10 to 11:30 a.m. on Friday, June 13. More information is available by calling moderator Robert A. Iadicicco at 508-693-9771.
Mosquito Bites Build Character
I slept with my first beetle at age eight. Ours was a casual affair; two souls finding refuge on my grandmother’s pull-out sofa. But, as with many relationships, what began as a simple nocturnal arrangement between insect and boy soon became a complicated and crowded tempestuous two week ordeal.
West Tisbury
JOHN S. ALLEY 508-693-2950 (alleys@vineyard.net) Sprinkle a little salt over your left shoulder before reading today’s column as it is Friday the 13th. It was a toasty warm weekend with the temperature reaching almost 90 degrees. Lots of folks went to the beaches and held backyard barbecues. It is getting busier by the day and…
The Fishermen
By MARK ALAN LOVEWELL Larry’s Tackle Shop has a new owner. He is the same guy who has been behind the counter and stocking the walls with fishing gear for years. Steve V. Purcell has stepped from managing the store to owner and he did it with little fanfare back in March. For him, this…
Outermost Inn Prepares for Liquor Sales
A glass of wine or beer at the end of the day is relaxing and may have health benefits, it is said. Hugh and Jeanne Taylor hope the addition of beer and wine sales to the dinner menu at the Outermost Inn will have the same effect on their business. The inn has been granted…
Gazette Chronicle: Noisy Glide
Noisy Gli de From the Vineyard Gazette editions of June, 1983:
Water Taking by Landscapers Spurs Concern in West Tisbury
West Tisbury selectmen want to clarify whether the town can restrict private companies taking water from public land. Selectmen this week approved a request by conservation commission chairman Prudy Burt to ask town counsel Ronald H. Rappaport to review the town’s authority to regulate or prohibit water taking. Ms. Burt said she had seen a…
Managing Conservation Land With Fire
The back of the T-shirt read: “Burn Crew 2007. Burning landscapes near you.” Under those words was the equivalent of a band’s performance schedule, a dozen locales across six states. And even though the wearer of the shirt and eight other members of her group were sitting around in a circle in a weedy clearing…
County Commissioner Announces Resignation
Paul Strauss of Oak Bluffs will retire on June 30 from his seats on the Dukes County Commission, the Martha’s Vineyard Commission and Dukes County Charter Study Commission. In a letter read at the county commission’s Wednesday meeting, Mr. Strauss stated that his decision to retire “is based solely on age and age-related health care…
What Future for America the Brave?
By accident of birth or some would say by destiny, my generation is about to live through yet another sea change of consciousness in this great experiment called the United States of America.
Chilmark
JANE N. SLATER 508-645-3378 (slaterjn@comcast.net) The news is that Chilmark feels the heat. This week wasn’t June in January, it was more like August in June. Our weather was very hot and humid for several days . . . not much like our usual June but very much like those few days in August when…
Fishermen Face Licensing Law
Vineyard saltwater recreational anglers are expressing mixed feelings about an unprecedented requirement that they’ll need a license next year when they fish. “I hate it. I wish it didn’t happen,” said Janet Messineo, an avid recreational fisherman who also is president of the Martha’s Vineyard Surfcasters Association, said about the new rule.
Moon and Southern Sky
The gibbous moon moves through the southern sky in the evenings ahead. On Monday night the moon appears right under the bright red star Antares in the zodiacal constellation Scorpius. Antares is one of the largest and distant stars visible in our evening sky. The star is 600 light years away, twice the distance astronomy…
Longtime Oak Bluffs Residents Share Early Memories of Town
It was as if those audio vignettes so often played on the nearby National Public Radio station WCAI were being spoken out loud, live and seriatum at the Oak Bluffs library: “I used to carry all the bags off the steamboat, then the ice, and then deliver letters. We’d go to the fish market and…
Aquinnah
JUNE MANNING 508-645-2574 (lthslnks@gis.net)
Thanks for Calling: Employers Say Most Summer Jobs Filled
Leanne Giordano, restaurant manager at one of the Island’s most popular — and busiest — family restaurants, is fully staffed for the summer. And she has a running list of more than 150 prospective waiters, waitresses and bussers to call just in case a position opens.
Island Students Earn Journalism Awards
Student journalists at Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School won 10 major scholastic journalism awards at the annual New England Scholastic Press Association conference held recently at Boston University. The 10 journalism awards tied a school record for most awards earned during one school year. The association program offers awards for excellence in scholastic writing, editing,…
Peafowl, not Peacock
“Susan, I have what I swear is a peacock hanging precariously onto my niger (thistle seed) feeder. Earlier the same bird was enjoying cooling off in my garden sprinkler. I am sure it is someone’s pet — do you know who owns peacocks in West Tisbury?”
Catamaran Arabella Sold To Business in Florida
The Arabella has set sail from the Island for the last time. The 50-foot catamaran owned by Hugh Taylor of Aquinnah was sold last week to Daytona Beach Catamaran and will soon begin sailing from Ponce de Leon inlet in Florida. For the past 15 years the Arabella has been a familiar summer presence here…
