Aquinnah

Aquinnah Files Suit Against Tribal Move

The Aquinnah building inspector filed a lawsuit this week against
the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) to test the question of
whether the tribe must follow local zoning rules.

"A genuine controversy exists on this issue requiring judicial
guidance," wrote Aquinnah town counsel Ronald H. Rappaport in the
complaint.

It is Official: It's Aquinnah

One week after the bill was laid on his desk, acting Gov. Paul Cellucci yesterday signed into law the change that has been awaited by the Island’s smallest town since almost a year ago. The governor’s signature made it official.

The town of Gay Head is no more; long live the town of Aquinnah.

Right Whales Seen in Waters Off Gay Head

One of the rarest creatures on the earth, the endangered right whale, was seen near the Vineyard Tuesday. The sighting off the Gay Head Cliffs is for the record books, a first for the Vineyard in a long time.

The Northeast Right Whale is one of the world’s most endangered marine mammals, with only slightly more than 300 known to be in existence. One was observed from an airplane while it was feeding.

Crunch III Reduces 44 Cars to Hunks of Steaming Junk

“It seems like total destruction the only solution.” - Bob Marley.

Alan Trustman, who write the screenplay for Bullitt, once told a group of college students interested in movie writing that almost nothing tickled the average American more than watching wanton destruction of valuable personal property. Don’t ask me to explain it, he said, but Americans can’t get enough of glass breaking and car crashing.

Gay Head School Out for Summer and for Good

High on a windy promontory at the end of the Island stands the Gay Head School. It is a one-room school with all the traditional trimmings, from flag to red paint, that one-room schools are supposed to have. Outside there is a playground and a pond, and inside there are actually two rooms, but one is used as a kitchen-storeroom-catch-all sort of place and the other is a classroom.
 
For the past eleven years, Mrs. James Manning has been the teacher at the school, teaching kindergarten through the fourth grade to a varying number of children.
 

To Revive the Gay Head Civic Association

On Sunday afternoon, a meeting was held in Gay Head of former directors and members of the old Gay Head Improvement Association. This organization was incorporated under the laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in February of 1914, and for a number of years was active in promoting community welfare in Gay Head.
 

Electrification of Gay Head Is Progressing

Good progress on the electrification of Gay Head is reported by James M. Lumbert, superintendent of the Cape & Vineyard Electric Company. All the wire has been run, except for the tap and spur into the East Pasture. Of course this does not mean the end of the job for the linemen, who must now retrace their steps, tie the wire on the insulators, and make other finishing touches.
 
Map of Martha's Vineyard, 1933

Guide to the South Road Has Many Landmarks

South Road, the main artery of travel between eastern and western extremities of the Vineyard is at once outstanding in its natural scenery and its historical associations. Beginning, properly, opposite Parsonage Pond in West Tisbury village, it extends through Chilmark and Gay Head to the lighthouse and the country park on the headland in that town, where thousands go each year to view the famous Gay Head cliffs.

Gay Head

The following is a copy of the bill incorporating the new town of Gay Head.
 
Sect. 1. The district of Gay Head is hereby abolished, and the territory comprised therein is hereby incorporated into a town by the name of Gay Head. And said town of Gay Head is hereby invested with all the powers, privileges, rights and immunities, and subject to all the duties and requisitions to which other towns are entitled and subject by the constitution and laws of this Commonwealth.
 

New Light House at Gay Head

We learn from Samuel Flanders, Esq., that a light house is to be erected at Gay Head the coming fall. It is to be located about five or six rods back of the present one. The light, at an altitude of 60 feet, will be seen by mariners over Noman’s Land, which will be of great service. A new dwelling house is also to be erected. An appropriation of $13,000 was made at the last session of Congress to cover the expense of constructing these buildings.

 

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