Up in West Tisbury, past the airport but before the Mill Pond, is a small building. A part of both Island and national history, it serves as a social and cultural melting pot and a way to track economic trends. It is the Lillian Manter Memorial Hostel and, on a recent Tuesday morning shortly after 10 a.m., every bed was booked, but not a guest was around. The hot July sun was out and the groups of bikers and summer campers, the travellers from Canada and Germany and the friends shacked up in the one private room were all off exploring the Island.

Jessica Pisano, founder of Belushi Pisano Gallery and an established artist, opens a new solo exhibition with a reception tonight, Friday, August 1, from 5 to 8 p.m. at the gallery on State Road in Vineyard Haven.

Over the past decade, Ms. Pisano has combined her black and white photography with painting. Using her photography as her canvas, Ms. Pisano paints with media including, oil, pastel and acrylics. In this series of new work, she will showcase her mixed media work presented on birch panel, tile and antique tin or wood frames.

It was U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell’s Feb. 5, 2003 address to the United Nations which convinced Bob Drogin that Saddam Hussein had stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction.

Until then, said Mr. Drogin, who covers issues of weapons proliferation, terrorism and intelligence — nukes, kooks and spooks — out of Washington for the Los Angeles Times, “I was a sceptic.”

Overfishing may be the buzz word on the waterfront to explain the decline of many stocks of fish around Vineyard waters, but it isn’t heard often enough when it comes to explaining the loss of bait fish.

On Wednesday night at the Chilmark Public Library, a lone man stood before an audience of anglers and commercial fishermen to report the worst environmental tale needing to be told is the loss of one of the most valued forage fish in the ocean, which used to swim in abundance in these waters but is almost gone — menhaden.

Built on Stilts Slots

A few available performance slots for the Island’s dance festival coming August 15 to 19 and 23 and 24. Please e-mail Built on Stilts Director, Abby Bender, at shakes9999@yahoo.com or visitbuiltonstilts.org for more information. Theater, dance, improvisation and music are welcome. Final programming due by August 5.

Though hundreds will go to Menemsha to see the sunset this weekend, there is an even better event that follows afterward without anyone having to move.

Island Plan Forum

The next Island Plan summer forum, which will deal with the Vineyard’s built environment, will be held Monday, August 4 at 7:30 p.m. at Union Chapel on Kennebec avenue in Oak Bluffs.

The forum will discuss Vineyard buildings, neighborhoods, streetscapes and public spaces. At the forum, the Island Plan Built Environment Work Group will present its preliminary recommendations. Admission is free.

In 1954, Budd Schulberg wrote his Academy Award-winning screenplay for On the Waterfront. Now 94, the writer and playwright traveled from Menemsha to Scotland this week to see a new stage version of the classic film performed at the Edinburgh International Festival.

“I’m really looking forward to this,” Mr. Schulberg said over the phone before taking off for the week-long trip. In the background his wife, Betsy worried aloud about getting his heart medication on the trans-Atlantic flight.

Navy Ensign Brett A. MacLaren, the son of Navy Capt. Ron J. MacLaren of Oak Bluffs, recently completed the Navy nuclear power training unit course at Naval Nuclear Power Training Command, Goose Creek, S.C.

Ensign MacLaren received instruction about nuclear theory, chemistry, physics, reactor operations, safety and security. Upon completion of the course, he was designated a nuclear power operator.

Skip Petersen, a graduate of the Pratt Institute of Fine Arts, presents a gallery show of her work, which she defines as “abstract oil in very bright colors” — hence the title of the show, Brilliance.

The exhibition opens tomorrow, Saturday, August 2, at the Pebble Building of Featherstone Center for the Arts, with a reception from 4 to 7 p.m. The show will hang through August 13.