Seasonal Vineyarder Robert Boggs was onboard the Andrea Doria with his family on July 26, 1956, when the Italian luxury ocean liner sank off the Island's coast. Mr. Boggs, who now lives in California, looked back at the event 70 years later.

In this week's 10-minute wrap-up from the Vineyard Gazette newsroom, we hear from a survivor of a 70-year-old shipwreck off the Vineyard coast. And get ready for the Agricultural Fair, one week early this year!

“I didn’t know that I would ever want to see salt water again,” mused Dr. Robert Boggs of West Chop as he and his family prepared for the beach on Sunday.

Dr. and Mrs. Boggs, their daughter Barbara, 16, and their son Robert, 12, are all survivors of the sinking of the Italian liner Andrea Doria, off Nantucket last week, and they reckon themselves as being highly favored by whatever gods may be, that they are together, well, uninjured and able to tell of their frightening experience.

We went out looking yesterday morning for the Andrea Doria, heaving pitilessly in the Atlantic about sixty-five miles southeast of the Vineyard. But we missed her by barely a quarter of an hour, for she had already turned over and disappeared into the depths.

The first phone call had come about 4:30 a.m. We were asked if word had got around of the great collision off Nantucket between the Italian luxury vessel, carrying upwards of 1700 persons, both crew and passengers, and the Swedish liner, Stockholm, with a complement of more than 700, during immersement in a fog bank.

A manned submersible and crew, midway through an expedition surveying the famous shipwreck Andrea Doria south of Nantucket, paid a visit to Menemsha Monday.

Saving Grace

From Gazette editions of July, 1956:

I didn’t know that I would ever want to see salt water again,” mused Dr. Robert Boggs of West Chop as he and his family prepared for the beach. Dr. and Mrs Boggs, their daughter Barbara, 16, and son Robert, 12, are all survivors of the sinking of the Andrea Doria off Nantucket last week, and they reckon themselves as being highly favored by whatever gods may be, that they are together, well, uninjured and able to tell of their frightening experience.