World War Two

April 16, 1943

Airport Is Carved Out of Wilderness

Vineyard Gazette
The airfield on the central plain of Martha’s Vineyard is beginning to shape up as something more than raw earth, mud, and the destination of building materials trucked over the roads from the st
World War Two
Naval Auxiliary Air Facility
Martha's Vineyard Airport
August 31, 1945

Experimental Base a Well-Kept Secret

Vineyard Gazette
The well-kept secret of the Army's experimental base at Katama during the fall and early winter of 1943 is disclosed at last, in this issue of the Gazette. Ten miles of heavy pipe were delivered, with other equipment, beginning in August, and during the following months five one-mile lengths of pipe were laid in the ocean with the aid of tugs, and welded together into an experimental pipeline under conditions similar to those which would be encountered in laying a gasoline supply line under the English Channel.
World War Two
South Beach

1941

December 12, 1941

Rod and Gun Club Ready to Form Shotgun Brigade

Vineyard Gazette
World War Two
Martha's Vineyard Rod and Gun Club
The Martha’s Vineyard Rod and Gun Club, more than 200 strong, will report, in case of emergency, as a shotgun brigade, according to a resolution adopted by the club on Wednesday night. The club discussed possibilities of an invasion with grim and practical earnestness before adopting the resolution, taking a report of the arms owned by its membership which consist of at least one shotgun to a man and a number of rifles. Given any sort of break, the club felt that its membership could add considerably to the unpleasant situation of an enemy should one appear.
 
December 12, 1941

Vineyard Boys Serving in Far Eastern Forces

Vineyard Gazette
World War Two
Pearl Harbor
A tremor of mixed excitement and dread swept the Vineyard on Sunday when the first news of the Japanese attack on the Pacific islands became known through the radio broadcasts. Not for eighty years has this Island scene been duplicated, when the opening of the Civil War found Vineyard men at sea and in or near the war zone. The opening of this Far Eastern war likewise finds Vineyard men in or near the scene, not merely in ships of commerce, but in the armed forces of the country.
December 12, 1941

Island Accepts Challenge of Air Alarm Quietly

Vineyard Gazette
World War Two
Civilian Defense organizations of the Island responded to their first real call to duty about 1:30 Tuesday afternoon, when air raid signals were sounded the length of the coast, following the report of hostile planes off New York city, a tip which proved unfounded and which some reports say was planned by the government as a test of the air raid facilities of the northeastern coast.
 
December 12, 1941

Island Quota $4,250

Vineyard Gazette
World War Two
Martha’s Vineyard’s share in the $50,000,000 war fund asked by Norman H. Davis, national chairman of the American Red Cross, is $4,250. Mr. Davis’ appeal was broadcast Monday night and alluded to the destruction wrought at Hawaii and other points attacked by the Japanese.
 
December 12, 1941

Editorial: A Century Lies Between

Vineyard Gazette
World War Two
Pearl Harbor
One wonders what Nathaniel M. Jernegan would think if he were alive. Or his wife. They were together on the whaleship Eliza Mason in 1851 when Captain Jernegan sailed his vessel into Hakodate while Perry was still there. This was one of the first of the treaty ports when Japan was opened, reluctantly, to the world, and Mrs. Jernegan was the first white woman to sleep ashore in Japan for more than two hundred years.
 
October 17, 1941

Peaked Hill Contours Undergo Marked Change

Vineyard Gazette
World War Two
Peaked Hill

The contours of Peaked Hill, as viewed from the Middle Road, have changed almost beyond belief, due largely to the construction of the road which winds around its steep sides and has been carved deeply into them. The hill is topped by one of the skeleton towers so largely used for signaling purposes, and is now manned by a detachment of the U.S. Army Signal Corps. The handful of men assigned here, presumably in connection with the tests now going on to prove or disprove the effectiveness of coastal defenses against invasion, is quartered in tents on the hill.

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