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
February 4, 2011
Cronkite Heirs Sell Green Hollow Home
The late Walter Cronkite’s Edgartown down-harbor home was sold this week for $11.3 million to longtime summer residents of Katama David and Karen Brush.
The Green Hollow property is located where the first white men settled for the winter on Martha’s Vineyard in 1632.
Eating Well, Doing Good
Eating Well, Doing Good
’Tis better to give than to devour. Even better to give while feasting.
That’s right, the shark is looking to do good while still doing what comes most natural. Eating.
On Tuesday, Feb. 8 Sharky’s in Edgartown will be holding a benefit for the Friends…
Map the World Wide Web
Map the World Wide Web
Feeling a little lost on the Internet these days? The Chilmark Public Library is hosting a free workshop series called Getting Connected to help. Beginning Wednesday, Feb. 9, it is aimed at helping computer users experience more from the Internet and connect with friends, family and customers.
…
Foreign Policy Matters
Foreign Policy Matters
Vineyarders who want to learn about and participate in foreign policy decision-making, take note: a Great Decisions Discussion Group begins on Thursday. Feb. 10 at 7 p.m., and runs for eight successive Thursdays at the Vineyard Haven Public Library.
Witness to Haiti’s Struggle
Witness to Haiti’s Struggle
Over the years, the Martha’s Vineyard community has made a commitment to Haiti through numerous fundraisers, groups of Islanders traveling to the country to assist in myriad ways and by being host to Haitian artists here on the Island. It is a movement that began many years before the…
Photo Contest
Photo Contest
The 21st Century School Fund, Healthy Schools Campaign, and Critical Exposure announce Through Your Lens, a photo and essay contest showcasing the reality of our nation’s school facilities. Students, teachers and community members are invited to show the world what they see every day at school: the good parts, the troubling…
Whaling Way Back in the Early Days
James A. (Jim) Tuck, an archaeologist who has sifted through coastline soil looking for stories that go back centuries here and afar, gave a talk Saturday night at the Barnacle Club. Mr. Tuck, a resident of Hines Point, has been exploring the earliest history of whaling in Labrador waters. His search has taken him back…
Oh, the Weather Off-Island Is Frightful
The winter of 2011 is one for the record books throughout the Northeast, but on the Vineyard it has been a different story altogether. Snow on the mainland has been measured in feet, while on the Vineyard it has been measured in inches. Ice has been the Vineyard’s most steady winter companion so far.
Museum Bullish on Vineyard Haven Move
The Martha’s Vineyard Museum has extended its option to buy the former Marine Hospital property in Vineyard Haven for four months while it evaluates fund-raising sources for what could be a $20 million relocation and renovation effort.
Museum director David Nathans said this week that building on the enthusiasm of abutters, the Martha’s…
Vineyard Voices Guide Museum Exhibit
The Martha’s Vineyard Museum heads to Vineyard Haven on Tuesday to learn from Islanders themselves about the history and personality of their town. The work is part of an effort to develop a permanent exhibit on Vineyard history funded by a $39,903 National Endowment for the Humanities grant.
New Location, Same Common Courtesy at the Steering Wheel
Tucked as it was into a quirky little spot in the middle of the busiest intersection on the Island, Courtesy Motors was a place where you always needed directions to find it, but once found you knew your car would be in good hands, whether for a simple oil change or a complicated clutch repair.…
MVC Pursues Demolition Review
The Martha’s Vineyard Commission decided this week to move forward with a public hearing on the proposed demolition of the Denniston House in Oak Bluffs regardless of the timetable for other town committees.
Aquinnah Aghast at Moshup Trail Poles
Aquinnah selectmen were unhappy to hear this week about an NStar project that began with no apparent notification to the town to replace the utility poles on scenic Moshup Trail with much taller poles.
Clarification
Clarification
A story in the Jan. 21 Gazette about two wind turbine projects on farms in Chilmark was unclear about the relationship of one person to a distinct group opposing the projects. Allen Farm abutter Jonathan Adler is not a member of the group battling a state plan to build turbines in waters…
Paramedic Upgrade for Edgartown
Edgartown fire chief Peter Shemeth told the town selectmen this week that the Edgartown emergency medical service is upgrading to a full-time paramedic unit. The switch comes on the heels of changed state regulations requiring full-time emergency personnel to be at a paramedic level in order to keep their certification.
“Starting way back…
Students Come In to Be Shadows For On-the-Job Work Experience
On Wednesday afternoon as the ice thickened on frozen Island streets, some teenagers played video games or napped while others spent the day laying the groundwork for their futures.
Thanks to the Martha’s Vineyard Youth Leadership Initiative’s first annual Job Shadow Day, 18-year-old Anthony Piland, an aspiring pilot, spent the day watching Martha’s…
High School Player Signs with Flourish
By PETER BRANNEN
The Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School imported an annual tradition from big-time college football recruiting on Wednesday as standout quarterback Randall Jette signed his intention to accept a full scholarship from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst during a ceremony in the high school gymnasium.
Family members and…
Online Island Map
Online Island Map
Lot lines, bus lines, trail lines, U.S. Geological Survey topography, and wetlands are a few of the layers available on a new Islandwide graphic information system (GIS) available online.
Found on the Internet at http://map.mvpsis.net/dukescounty/, the site is a work in progress combining the efforts of the…
Wave Lengths Goes Back to the Drawing Board
The owners of the Wave Lengths salon said they will go back to the drawing board after the Edgartown planning board made it clear this week they were unlikely to approve a plan to tear down the Upper Main street building and replace it with two large buildings on the property. At a public hearing…
Planning Board Hears Meat, Fish Market Plans
At a standing-room-only public hearing, the Edgartown planning board this week heard arguments for and against the proposed Edgartown Meat and Fish Market at the Triangle. Applicant John Ready faced questions about competition, traffic and trash, some of them from neighboring business owners.
Edgartown Film Company Gets Caustic
A resource for emergency response and safety personnel for over two decades, the DVD-based program Sodium Hydroxide & Potassium Hydroxide has been updated and rereleased by the Edgartown company Emergency Film Group.
Sodium hydroxide and potassium hydroxide are the two most widely used caustics, strong alkaline chemicals corrosive to many materials including human…
Tennis Doubles Travel to Compete
Five doubles teams representing the Vineyard Tennis Center traveled to Falmouth Sports Center to compete in a ladies doubles team competition on Saturday, Jan. 29.
The competition was fierce.
Perhaps exhausted by the choppy ferry ride, the Island team of Doreen Rezendes and Merle Lincoln fell short in a second set…
Museum Book Compiles Tales From World War II
Vineyarders’ experiences of World War II both at home and overseas are collected in a new book from the Martha’s Vineyard Museum based on its recent exhibition Those Who Serve: Martha’s Vineyard and World War II,
Narratives from interviews with 19 Vineyarders, along with contemporary and archival photographs, are brought together by oral…
Lora Marden to Marry
Lora Marden to Marry
Lora Marden and Todd Richardson of Quincy are pleased to announce their engagement.
Miss Marden, the daughter of Willard Marden 3rd of Oak Bluffs and Beth Marden of Bridgewater, and granddaughter of Beverly DeSorcy of Edgartown and Willard Marden Jr. of Falmouth, is a 2003 graduate of…
State Forest Clearing Begins
On Monday crews from R.J. Cobb Land Clearing moved into the Manuel F. Correllus State Forest to begin clearing some 90 acres of dead red pine trees that have been blighted in recent decades by the fungus diplodia pinea. The work is part of a larger three-year effort to remove 237 acres of timber that…
Science on Show
Science on Show
The science fair at the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School will be on Saturday, Feb. 12 at the school cafeteria and library. It is open to the public from 11 a.m. to noon.
Organized by science teacher Jackie Hermann, the science fair will feature projects from more than…
School Repairs Drain West Tisbury Budget
On Wednesday West Tisbury selectmen confronted the reality of what an unexpected $1.5 million in repairs needed for the West Tisbury School will do to an otherwise well-balanced town budget.
“This project is a serious challenge to our planning for the future here,” said selectman Richard Knabel at the board’s weekly meeting. Multimillion…
Rep. Keating’s Assignments
Rep. Keating’s Assignments
U.S. Rep. Bill Keating, the newest member of Massachusetts’ Congressional delegation, received his committee assignments for the 112th Congress.When he returns to Washington after his district work week, Rep. Keating will begin work on the House’s small business, homeland security and foreign affairs committees.
Handmade Valentines
Handmade Valentines
Make a valentine with your little one — art supplies will be provided — enjoy yummy treats, and check out Kiddo’s new home at 42 Circuit avenue during the store’s Valentine Socials set for Fridays, Feb. 4 and 11, from 10:30 to noon. Those who wish may enter their creation into…
Scholars Take Note
Scholars Take Note
The Permanent Endowment for Martha’s Vineyard is accepting applications for its 2011 scholarship program. Through the 17 scholarship funds it administers, the endowment is one of the largest providers of financial support for Island students. Last year, 54 scholarships totaling $123,600 were awarded to Vineyard high school seniors as well…
Super Bowl Swimmers
Super Bowl Swimmers
All set for the history-making sporting event on Sunday? That’s right, Sunday is when the young swimmers who make up the Makos, the swim team at the YMCA of Martha’s Vineyard, take on the Marshfield Swim Club team in their first competition swim meet.
The Makos’ inaugural races…
Old Parsonage House Fate Is in Question
The owners of the Old Parsonage house in West Tisbury have requested permission from the town historic district commission to demolish the 17th century home that sits on State Road overlooking Parsonage Pond.
Where Stovetops Speak and Energy Grid Talks Back
Off Old Farm Road in Chilmark at the end of a dirt road sits the new house of Dardanella and Sean Slavin and their two small children. Over the past year this house has become a home for the young family but it has also become a laboratory. Here, and in 32 other houses across…
Punxsutawney Phil Has Nothing On this Groundhog Day Gala
Had a groundhog stirred from his sleep on Martha’s Vineyard on Wednesday morning, he would not have seen his shadow, presaging a short time before spring. Cynthia Riggs was more concerned about the ice out on the landscape and roads on Wednesday morning when she woke up. For her this was a big social day,…
Oak Bluffs Shaves for Short-Term Savings Before Restructuring
After a month of wrestling with how to close a $238,000 budget gap, the Oak Bluffs selectmen finally took out their scalpels and began to make the required cuts on Tuesday at a special selectmen’s meeting.
Woodlands Plan Revives Campground
More than six years after it bought 190 acres of Oak Bluffs land to protect it from real estate development, the Martha’s Vineyard Land Bank has produced a management plan for the Southern Woodlands, providing for walkers, bikers, hunters and campers.
Islandwide Assessments Show Uneven Real Estate Recovery
A rising tide lifts all boats, they say. But the old aphorism about the economy apparently does not hold true for Vineyard real estate, as the most recent property valuations show.
Exploring Roots by Way of the Stomach
HIGH ON THE HOG: A Culinary Journey from Africa to America. By Jessica B. Harris. Bloomsbury, January 2011. 304 pages, photographs. $26, hardcover.
It amazes new students of ar chaeology that the most essential insights into a bygone community may be found in the humble section of rubble called the kitchen midden. It’s…
Quietly Holding Winter’s Hand
I drove into Owen Park and parked on the hill to hunt for my gloves. Driving while feeling under car seats is not good. I could have left them in a couple of places, or they might be in one of the pockets of the four layers I had on. Actually I hadn’t seen them…
Herding His Readers One by One
Every profession seems to produce a savant who can write about it with a sensibility that few equate with workers in that field. For chefs that writer is Anthony Bourdain, and in the same field, going farther back was George Orwell as a hapless busboy in Down and Out in Paris and London, letting us…
At Peace But Not Rest in the Off-Season
D eliberately or circumstantially, we are somewhat locked away, and an Island winter is a great equalizer, so one’s nature determines how it plays out. For those who relish inspiration from society and prefer external direction provided by entertainments and infusions of energy, the Island in winter is somewhat a bore, or worse . .…
Letters to the Editor
TOWERS OF HOPE
Editors, Vineyard Gazette:
It is time for us all to embrace wind power. What a joy it is to see these beacons of hope sprouting up here in New England. How can anyone who uses electricity not think the same? Isn’t it great driving from Woods Hole to…
Silent Stigma
Silent Stigma
We do not talk much about mental illness. Considering how widespread such disorders are — whether depression or dementia, bipolar or anxiety disorders, schizophrenia or some of the two hundred other possible diagnoses assigned to tens of millions of Americans each year — it is remarkable how singularly ill-prepared we are…
If I Could Save Time in a Bottle
Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m 64?
Those iconic words have rattled around in the back of my head for more than four decades. It never crossed my mind I would someday reach that milestone. Sixty-four! Why that borders on the upper end of middle age, for…
Up-Island School Values
Up-Island School Values
The cost of operating the Chilmark School is on the table for discussion again — this time in West Tisbury, which will carry the heaviest burden this year for the up-Island Regional School District budget.
The added cost burden can be tracked to increased enrollment of West Tisbury…
Welcome Benjamin
Welcome Banjamin
Amanda Dickson and Matthew Parker of Oak Bluffs announce the birth of a son, Benjamin Arthur Parker, born on Jan. 31, 2011, at the Martha’s Vineyard Hospital. Benjamin weighed 6 pounds, 10 ounces at birth.
Aquinnah
JUNE D. MANNING
508-645-2574
(lthslnks@gis.net)
The Martha’s Vineyard Center for Living would like to thank one and all for another successful cultural luncheon at the Grill on Main on Jan. 29. Thank you to Chef Tony Saccoccia and his staff for hosting us and a most delicious luncheon. Keynote…
Chilmark
JANE N. SLATER
508-645-3378
(slaterjn@comcast.net)
Chilmark has seen the last of January. Actually she treated us better than many other places in New England. As I write midweek, the ground is clear and very little snow remains. The rains were hard for awhile this week and more welcome than…
Please Adopt Us
Please Adopt Us
Takes a Kid Critic to Review Kid Films
Violet Cabot reviews a program of short films for a family film screening on Saturday at 5 p.m. at the Chilmark Community Center.
Strega Nona is a story about Big Anthony not doing what he was told. The story of Strega Nona takes place in Italy. Strega Nona means grandma witch. In this…
Feast for Eyes, Yummy for Tummy
The final Family, Film, Feast event of the season takes place Saturday, Feb. 5 at 5 p.m. at the Chilmark Community Center.
Those who attended the last go-around earlier this month are still rubbing our stomachs filled joyfully with Indian food care of Kitchen Porch and Slow Food. Those who were otherwise occupied…
Unwrapping the Enigma Behind an Abstract Artist
The abstract artist Vaclav Vytlacil (1892-1984) ran with a pretty serious art crowd. The names are icons of the form: Louise Bourgeois, Cy Twombly and Robert Rauschenberg to name just a few. He also established the American Abstract Artists group with Arshile Gorky and William deKooning to help educate the American public regarding this new…
Walking the Outdoor Walk
Walking the Outdoor Walk
Oh, the snow. Oh, the cold. Oh, what shall we do? How will we survive?
First step is to turn off the weather channel and head outdoors. No matter what Jim Cantore says, the king of weather catastrophe hyperbole, a bit of winter weather is something to…
Getting Gleeful
Getting Gleeful
The newly formed song-and-dance group MV Glee will debut next Sunday, Feb. 13, with a 7 p.m. show at Katharine Cornell Theatre in Vineyard Haven.
The show includes the IMPers, IMP’s high school improv troupe, who will create a never-before-seen Glee episode based on audience suggestions.
MV…
The Lobster Bowl
The Lobster Bowl
The Patriots may be sitting out this Super Bowl, but here on the Island there will still be a bit of New England to enjoy while watching the big game.
Grace Church is opening its doors on Sunday, Feb. 6 from noon until 2 p.m. and offering up…
Baroque Concert for the Heart
Valentines Day is fast approaching. Hearts aflutter, chocolates galore, perhaps a nice dinner for your sweet.
Why not add music? After all, a day devoted to love should be a sensory smorgasbord.
On Sunday, Feb. 13 at 4 p.m. the West Tisbury Congregational Church serves up the perfect appetizer by hosting…
Do the Spike Lee Thing
Remember when you first met Mars Blackmon and Nola Darling? That was about 1986 and Mars was out begging for some action. “Please baby please. Please baby, baby please.”
It was the start of a career that has made headlines ever since.
But perhaps time has clouded the experience or maybe nothing…
Fire Breathing and Fun Loving
Fire Breathing and Fun Loving
The three-D kids’ flick How to Train Your Dragon this week won three Visual Effects Society awards, including outstanding animation, so it’s definitely one to see on the big screen rather than popping in the DVD in the living room when the ankle-biters are getting too antsy.
…
Take a Hike, With Pleasure
By LIZ DURKEE
WALKINGS TRAIL OF MARTHA’S VINEYARD: The Comprehensive Pocket Guide to Island Trails, William Flender, Fourth Edition, Vineyard Conservation Society, Martha’s Vineyard, MA, 2010, $14.95, 117 PAGES.
A weatherproof, pocket-sized, fully-loaded guide to the Island’s walking trails. What a concept! It is such a good idea that the Vineyard…
Hooting for Love
Hooting for Love
The animal kingdom does not have an official Valentine’s Day to celebrate the joining of hearts. After all, wings or claws make it a bit difficult to pen odes of endearment or hold a pair of scissors to make those doily hearts. But that doesn’t mean the ardor of animal…
No Wrong Answer When Wondering Where to Walk
There’s a sense of wonder when you walk the trails at Waskosim’s Rock Reservation in Chilmark on a winter day. Dry leaves crunch under your feet on the meandering flat trails that lead you to the stream. It’s easy to be distracted by the moving water, one of few sounds in earshot, but be careful…
Dean’s List
Dean’s List
Maureen Fitzpatrick of Oak Bluffs has been named to the dean’s list for Champlain College’s fall 2010 semester. Ms. Fitzpatrick is majoring in early childhood/elementary education.
She is the daughter of Thomas Fitzpatrick of Oak Bluffs, and Lisa Fitzpatrick of Oak Bluffs.
Starting From Seed
I will do anything to avoid doing my taxes. Honestly I need to be locked in an empty room with my receipts and no phone.
Hard Knocks
With a deer, you would never grab the bull by the horns.
For a few good reasons: Male deer are not called bulls, they are bucks, and they do not have horns, only antlers. Antlers and horns are two distinctly different accessories.
Love at First Bird Sight
There are all manner of firsts, first steps, first love, first kiss and, for birders, a first sighting of a particular bird species. Known as a “lifer,” or life bird, the view of a species which had escaped you previously or is in a new habitat is exciting. A fair percentage of bird-watchers keep life…
