These are questions which have taken considerable of the Gazette staff’s time for the past week or so, and the result is not substantial.

For the sheep grazing in pastures above Vineyard Sound, the patches of weathered canvas beating toward Holmes Hole were barely worth a glance away from meals of September grass. Farmers, townspeople and public officials, however, greeted the approach of some four dozen English-flagged vessels with a bit more alarm.

The remote northern end of Chappaquiddick has been bustling with activity this spring as cleanup of World War II-era practice bombs begins.

The state police bomb squad was called to Chappaquiddick after the discovery of two World War II practice bombs, later determined to be inert, on a remote barrier beach at Cape Pogue.

In 1945 the late Harvey Ewing was a 21-year-old tail gunner in a torpedo bomber in the South Pacific.

The Vineyard was a frightening place for a young girl to be during World War II, but exciting too. Servicemen were walking the streets before their deployment to Europe. Navy and Army pilots conducting training exercises overhead occasionally came crashing into the ocean. And there were the constant rumors of enemy spies and submarines along the Island’s shores.