They came by cars and on floats, others on oxen and some on foot, such as the Colonial Navy of Massachusetts Fife and Drum Corps, to celebrate the Fourth of July at the annual Edgartown parade.

More than 40 volunteers took turns Tuesday morning, reciting sections of the over 10,000 word address that Frederick Douglass first delivered to the Rochester Sewing and Anti-Slavery Society on July 5, 1852.

Aquinnah and Oak Bluffs celebrated the Fourth in singular style, with small town parades this morning at the most western edge of the Island and in the Methodist Camp Ground.

The boat line board of governors voted last week to postpone the launch a second time, to September, after agreeing earlier this year to move it from March to May.

Sitting North, you are dealt a motley collection of cards:

♠️ K 2
♥️ K 9 7 5 2
♦️ 8 6 3
♣️ K 3 2

As South, partner opens 1♠️. Faute de mieux, you respond 1NT. Partner rebids 2♦️. More often than not, partner will hold five spades, four diamonds and anywhere from 12 to 18 high-card points.

What to do now? Instead of leaving partner high and dry in 2♦️, you rightly revert to 2♠️. Though you have more diamonds in your hand, this strategy is known as “false preference.”

There are two important reasons for your decision.

The board voted unanimously at its June 28 meeting to reject Island Adventure Rentals’ application to resume moped rentals on Beach Road. The business had long been one of the few remaining moped rental operations on the Island but closed during the pandemic.

The Dukes County government is looking into the potential of changing a state finance law so it could have a more stable rainy day fund.

No one was hurt after a Jeep caught fire on Sea View avenue in Oak Bluffs Sunday.

On the fifth anniversary of the Federated Church’s dedication as part of The African-American Heritage Trail of Martha’s Vineyard, 14 Island residents gathered in the space to recite Frederick Douglass’s speech What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?

Soaring costs for steel, a surge in demand at shipyards, a shortage of skilled labor and the Steamship Authority’s own limitations all played their parts in the boat line’s failure to accurately estimate the cost of converting its new oil field vessels for use as freight ferries.