The Vineyard Gazette has received a Publick Occurrences award from the New England Newspaper and Press Association (NENPA) for its coverage of the Schifter house move on Chappaquiddick.

The award, presented at the NENPA fall conference Thursday, recognizes outstanding journalism for a series of stories written by Gazette reporter Sara Brown and accompanied by photographs by Ray Ewing.

A large portion of Tabor House Road in Chilmark will be closed for several days this week due to a repaving project.

The road will be closed from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday from the North Road intersection to the town landfill. Residents will be able to access Tiercel Lane and Middle Line Road from Middle Road until the paving reaches those roads.

An $85 million operating budget and a rate increase for freight trucks on the Vineyard run will be up for discussion when Steamship Authority governors hold their monthly meeting in Vineyard Haven this morning.

The meeting begins at 9:30 a.m. at the Katharine Cornell Theatre in Vineyard Haven.

After nearly a month of fair weather and intense fishing, the Vineyard’s fall classic, otherwise known as the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby, enters the home stretch this week.

And some big fish dominate the leader board. Daniel Hiemer still holds the top spot for boat bluefish with his monster 19.69-pounder that was caught the first week of the derby and is the largest blue caught off the Vineyard in 15 years.

Holly Alaimo, director of the annual Martha’s Vineyard Wind Festival, found an abandoned kite in the road earlier this year. The kite was shaped like an eagle, but the bird was flightless— cars were running right over it, she recalled. Ms. Alaimo took the kite and fixed it up, bringing it to the Wind Festival on Saturday.

When Charlotte Holloman was a little girl, only eight years old, she and her parents visited the summer home of Harry T. Burleigh on Martha’s Vineyard. Mr. Burleigh, best known for his instrumental role in arranging and publishing African American spirituals and bringing the songs to a wider audience, had long vacationed on the Island.

The eclipse will occur on the evening of Friday, Oct. 18, when the moon passes through the edge of the Earth’s shadow and loses some of its brightness. The peak moment when the full moon is most covered will be just before 8 p.m. 

The actual eclipse begins at 5:48 p.m. and is finished by 9:52 p.m., according to the Old Farmer’s Almanac website. This full moon is called the pumpkin moon. 

After nearly 10 years as a work in progress, the final phase of construction on the Lagoon Pond drawbridge in Tisbury is slated to begin this fall. “It’s been a long journey, I would say,” said Tisbury Department of Public Works director Fred LaPiana. “It’s nice to see it come to fruition.”

National health care reform rolled out Oct. 1, leaving some confused about if and how things will change, and others lost in the details of premiums and health insurance exchanges.

On the Vineyard, the staff at Vineyard Health Care Access is at the front lines, fielding calls from residents, receiving training on the new law, and answering questions about how things will change.

This year is the 68th anniversary of the Martha’s Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby. Stephen Amaral, 78, of Oak Bluffs, has fished in 67 of those derbies. Sometimes people don’t believe him when he says he’s fished in every derby but one, he said on a recent Wednesday afternoon, seated at his dining room table and surrounded by derby photographs and newspaper clippings.