A school of forty or fifty sturgeon was sighted off Wasque. Many Islanders had never heard of such a school before in these waters. The sturgeon were chasing the mackerel which ran right into the shore. All the sturgeon were big fish, believed to have run from 300 to 400 pounds apiece. It has always been said that when sturgeon arrived, the bluefish were here.

Summer On the Horizon

It certainly has been slow to arrive by the weather, which has been stubbornly cool and rainy this year; nevertheless summer has its official start this coming weekend with the solstice. And so we turn to the late nature writer Hal Borland, who wrote this about summer:

“Summer is considerably more than a solstice and the slow diminishing of daylight’s span in the annual march from spring to fall.

Tragedy Strikes at Home

The statistics paint a stark picture. Motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of death among fifteen to twenty-two-year-olds. And the already high odds of a teenage driver having an accident are highest in the summer months, when teens spend many more hours driving each week than during the school year.

The high stone wall curves around the small gray house as if enfolding it in a protective embrace. When the winter winds blew, hard and damp, across the north shore of the Island, those thoughtfully-placed granite stones shielded the house, and the people within it. It’s so easy to imagine the Tiltons listening to the wind moaning in the chimney piece as the sponge for the next day’s bread worked on the hearth.

From a June. 1991 column by Arthur Railton:

Packing is a science, no doubt about it. Making the most of the space you’ve got takes talent. And that’s true whether you’re packing a carry-on bag for the weekend or the family possessions for a household move. A good packing job looks so easy. Just put this over there and that over here, and there’s space for everything.

What follows is an edited selection from 20 reader comments that were posted on the Gazette Web site over the weekend in response to the fatal car crash.

My heart goes out to the parents and family of both of these young women.

Karen Bressler

Edgartown