The scene: a corridor in the Congress Hotel, Chicago. The time: mid-afternoon on a sultry July day in 1952. The cast: four or five radio reporters, a Chicago Tribune staffer, a photographer and a couple of reporters from the Associated Press and United Press. An air of expectation hovers over the scene.

There are times in our lives when incidents in the lives of people we do not know take on such profound meaning that we want to learn more. For me that came through a conversation with my husband, Bill Baker. He had heard the Very Rev. Dr. James A. Kowalski, dean of The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in New York city, speak at Union Chapel in Oak Bluffs.

The story the dean told in the church was so powerful that I felt an imperative to speak with him personally. I wanted to know more of this story.

Receives Degree

Tonya Leonard, a member of the class of 2008 at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., received a bachelor of science degree summa cum laude with honor in education studies.

Prior to commencement, she received the John P. Shepard Prize in Education Studies, named in honor of a former professor and given annually to the student who has demonstrated outstanding performance in both academic achievement and field work in education.

She is the daughter of Pia and Richard Leonard of Vineyard Haven.

Black-owned businesses on Martha’s Vineyard span its economic and cultural niches while catering to a general audience. They are inns, art galleries, boutiques and restaurants as well as service providers from real estate to holistic weight loss. But many African American business owners, year-rounders, vacationers and community leaders agree that, given the Island’s history and large African American summer population, there are not nearly enough black-owned businesses based here.

Swiss-born designer Stina Sayre has fashion in her genes. “I love to design, that’s what I do,” she said recently from her Vineyard Haven studio and store. “I come from a clothing family in Sweden. My grandfather started a clothing company and my uncles took it over. I worked in the business as a kid,” she said. Mrs. Sayre began taking classes and courses in design and technique. It wasn’t until moving to Martha’s Vineyard 20 years ago (after meeting her husband, Nevin, both champion windsurfers) that Mrs.

In this serialized novel set on the Vineyard in real time, a native Islander (“Call me Becca”) returns home after many years to help her eccentric Uncle Abe keep his landscaping business, Pequot, afloat. Abe has paranoid hatred of Richard Moby, the CEO of an off-Island wholesale nursery (and Abe’s ex-wife’s new beau). In recent chapters, Abe caught Moby selling illegal invasive plants and sent a plant-sample to the state authorities to prove it.

The Yard Arts! Kids, Family and Community festival programming continues. Besides the free family Saturday matinees every week (see above), The Yard is offering one more kids’ creative theatre workshop, an upcoming opportunity for kids to perform at the Tabernacle, and the Multi-Generational Performance Project with Sarah Wilbur.

The Yard promises a high-energy, laugh aloud evening of work by three very different artists: Jamal Jackson Dance Company (African/hip hop/contemporary dance), performance artist Claire Porter, and solo dancer Lorraine Chapman share the stage on Friday and Saturday, August 1 and 2 at 8 p.m., with a free family matinee on Saturday at 4 p.m. at The Yard, Middle Road in Chilmark.

Vineyard Playhouse patrons might be forgiven for a feeling of deja vu when viewing the lineup of mainstage shows Cambridge’s new Central Square Theatre selected for its first season. Two shows opened this past weekend — QED: An Evening with Richard Feynman and Coming Up for Air, An AutoJazzography — and both productions were developed on the stage on Church street, Vineyard Haven.

Concerned that the Bush administration has stepped up its threats against Iran, peace groups, including the Martha’s Vineyard Peace Council, are holding No War on Iran rallies on Saturday, August 2. The Vineyard rally will be at Five Corners at 1 p.m.

Organizer Chris Fried notes that on July 22, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice warned that Iran had two weeks to halt its development of nuclear energy or face further “punitive measures.” That deadline will expire on Tuesday, August 5.

For details, call Mr. Fried at 508-693-7741.