McGovern — Dowling

Maryellen and Joseph McGovern of Narragansett, R.I., announce the engagement of their daughter Kathryn to Michael Dowling, son of Jeanne and Douglas Dowling of Vineyard Haven.

At a meeting Friday morning, the Martha’s Vineyard airport commission swiftly approved a request for Nectar’s nightclub, and partners Flatbread Pizza Company, to sublease the Outerland property for a second season.

A yenta, in Jewish tradition, is a woman who without invitation meddles in other people’s business.

Merissa Nathan Gerson, 28, who grew up in Washington, D.C., and spent summers in Chilmark, (her mother is cookbook author Joan Nathan, her father Allan Gerson, an attorney), has launched a Web site and advice column called Ask Your Yenta.com, in the process single-handedly reinventing the role for the new generation.

It was a community bash for Mary Fisher’s 103rd birthday on Monday. The outdoor party at Windemere Nursing Home and Rehabilitation Center included refreshments and a big birthday cake. Sunscreen was passed around along with colorful, bright hats for the residents.

High praise was offered to the Edgartown fourth grade teacher who retired 40 years ago and is still remembered fondly by former students. And to the staff at the nursing home, Mrs. Fisher is a star.

While many people this week were thinking beach, as summer weather settled over the Island, at the Martha’s Vineyard Arena they were thinking ice.

Good ice is essential to good skating, and a good Zamboni machine is essential to good ice.

And after months of planning, wishing and fund-raising, the arena has a new Zamboni.

The machine that resurfaces the ice, made by the Zamboni family company, arrived at the arena on Tuesday morning after a journey from Paramount, Calif.

Both the boys’ and girls’ lacrosse teams defeated their inter-Island rivals from Nantucket this week, as the girls rolled over the Whalers by a final of 18-5 and the boys won by a comfortable margin of 10-5. In recent years the teams have engaged in epic battles on both sides of the Sound, as both schools have featured strong lacrosse programs.

Colley Graduates

Christina Marie Colley, daughter of Carlos and Joanne Colley of Oak Bluffs, earned a bachelor of arts, magna cum laude in psychology and elementary education, from Saint Michael’s College, on May 13, 2010, in ceremonies held on the campus of the liberal arts residential Catholic college located in the Burlington area of Vermont.

Escape from Siberia

As America takes a long weekend to remember the sacrifices made by our men and women in uniform, Islander Anita Hotchkiss and the Vineyard Haven library are offering Islanders an opportunity to learn more about the kind of atrocities that Allied forces fought and died to end.

In 1939, amid the political turmoil that eventually erupted into World War II, a treaty between the Soviets and Germany was signed dividing Poland in half.

The halls of the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School were flooded with green and yellow on Friday, as students celebrated the first Brazilian awareness day to honor the Island’s large Brazilian population.

Sitting in a coffee shop in Oak Bluffs this week, Casandra Paasche could barely contain her hands as she spoke. Though speaking to a hearing person, her hands followed up every word with a signed gesture. As a sign language interpreter, she has made a career of translating spoken English for the deaf, and signing comes as naturally to her as breathing.