Family and friends filled Union Chapel Tuesday to celebrate the long life of Marie B. Allen, the former president of the Martha’s Vineyard branch of the NAACP.

Silly string coated Main street Saturday night as the Tisbury Street Fair brought music, local vendors, food and flocks of people to Vineyard Haven for the annual town birthday party.

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.

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.

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?

An unusual problem has crept up during the slow start to summer for some Island workers: there’s not enough work.