Opinion
From the Vineyard Gazette editions of May, 1955: The project of the regional high school is now before the Island towns again. We believe it is still true that no authority in the field of education has recommended any other solution than this for the Vineyard’s high school problems. This does not mean that a regional school plan can ever represent perfection. It does mean that educators find here the conditions for which a regional school is most nearly ideal, and that such a school can offer better opportunities for Island children than any other.
From the Vineyard Gazette editions of May, 1908: The lovely weather of the past week has been improved by housekeepers in having carpets beaten and a general war on dirt. Everyone is hustling to get their house in trim for the summer season. There have been many arrivals here during the week past of summer residents who have come to look after their property and have repairs or improvements made.
The vehicle safety situation on this little island is pretty funky indeed. We have no police or mechanics or any other way of keeping tabs on the condition of vehicles, or fixing them if we do find something wrong. What we do know is if it runs we should drive it. Then there’s the rust thing; even if you wanted to fix something, the odds of getting through to rusty bolts without breaking them off are pretty slim. Cars and trucks seem to dissolve around here. It’s like parking your car on the beach for months with all kinds of storms blowing through them all the time.
A friend’s son recently started playing Little League and my friend was philosophically relaying the fact that his son was playing right field. There was disappointment in his voice. I said that I had heard over the years right field had actually become less the place to hide a poor player and more the place to put a kid with a strong arm, a la Roberto Clemente. I’m not sure where I had heard this.
I’m old and don’t like change. I’ve balked, moaned and resented the roundabout going in right up the road. But I’m a sentimental fool. I’m nostalgic for the blinker light, the old blinker light, with red on two sides. The one I used to speed through on the way back from parties.
Why be nostalgic for long gone places?
One was a year-round resident who taught music to Vineyard school children for nearly fifty years and handed out daffodils in the name of cancer research every spring. The other was a dynamic leader in the world of fundraising for academic and nonprofit institutions, a seasonal resident who quietly brought her considerable know-how to Martha’s Vineyard Community Services and other Island nonprofits.