It begins with a hiss, rises momentarily toward a cathedral organ blast, then fades to an echoing cry — ancient, urgent, soulful and powerful.

Before the end of the month, if all goes well, Vineyarders and visitors alike will hear this wail calling across Vineyard Haven harbor and, at other moments, along the Oak Bluffs shoreline for the first time since the late summer of 1973.

One hundred and fifty-six students gathered under the roof of the Tabernacle for one last time Sunday as they prepared to graduate from Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School as the class of 2012.

In the moments before the ceremony began, families, friends and teachers chatted anxiously about the lack of sleep they suffered waiting for this day, using graduation pamphlets to fan away the heat — or perhaps their nerves.

Tisbury School Awards

The Tisbury School held its Recognition Day for the fifth to eighth grades on Wednesday, June 13. During the ceremony, all students were recognized for their individual contributions towards a positive school environment.

The following special awards were also given:

Jeffrey T. Goodale Memorial Award to James Douglas Norton - grade 5.

Dorothy Larkosh Roberts Award to Salyn Yancey - grade 6.

Rose Anthony Award for Achievement in Literary Arts to Alexandra Barlett and Ashley Wood - grade 7.

A year late and still not ready to be occupied, the Tisbury Emergency Services Facility is slowly but surely inching toward completion.

Inside the Polly Hill Arboretum office on Monday afternoon sits Collections and Grounds Manager Tom Clarke with a number of black oak twigs and branches on his desk, one just brought in by arborist John McCarter an hour earlier. With acorns dangling and new foliage sprouting, the twigs are seemingly healthy.

Look closer and each twig has hundreds of miniscule holes; the once smooth, skinny branches are now bumpy and swollen.

Once emerging from these tiny holes were the cynipid gall wasps currently attacking black oak trees up and down the Island.

In the wake of overwhelming votes in five Island towns against the controversial roundabout project, a longtime member of the Martha’s Vineyard Commission has called for the regional planning agency to revisit its own position on the plan.

At the end of the MVC meeting last Thursday night, Leonard Jason Jr. announced his intention to request a new vote on the controversial roundabout planned for the blinker intersection in Oak Bluffs, a divisive, much-debated issue on the Vineyard.

SHREWSBURY — Capping a dream season, the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School boys’ tennis team won the Division 3 state championship Thursday for the first time in history. The boys defeated Nashoba 4-1 on outdoor courts at the St. John’s High School tennis complex, finishing their season with a perfect 23-0 record.

Thimble Farm, 40 acres of fertile farmland in the center of the Vineyard whose future has been uncertain for the better part of the last year, will be saved as a working farm.

Gladys Widdiss of Aquinnah, a longtime Native American leader, noted potter and tribal historian who led the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head for many years, died at the Martha’s Vineyard Hospital on Wednesday. Although she was 97 and frail, Mrs. Widdiss was alert and active. The day before she died she had gone on a happy outing to the cliffs and Menemsha, and in recent weeks she had enjoyed trips to the Whiting Farm with Lynn Whiting of West Tisbury, a Hospice volunteer who was a frequent visitor, and afternoons of card playing.

It begins with a hiss, rises momentarily toward a cathedral organ blast, then fades to an echoing cry — ancient, urgent, soulful and powerful.

Before the end of the month, if all goes well, Vineyarders and visitors alike will hear this wail calling across Vineyard Haven harbor and, at other moments, along the Oak Bluffs shoreline for the first time since the late summer of 1973.