Phyllis Meras
On cold, clear winter Vineyard days, I have trouble staying indoors. I am always tempted to set off for a walk in the woods or along a beach. The air is fresh, the sky blue. Trees gray as elephants stand out against the blueness of the sky.
And so it was on Monday, Martin Luther King Day. The air was a crisp 20, the sky the blue of medieval religious paintings, and tree limbs were clearly etched against it. Driving on Barnes Road near the Oak Bluffs water works, I stopped for a walk along the Lagoon.
There I was on the steps of the Tower of London where Anne Boleyn and Lady Jane Grey and Sir Thomas More, among others, lost their heads — and I lost my wallet.
There’s no comparison, of course, but history buff that I am — their names couldn’t help but pass through my mind as I reached into my handbag for my wallet on a recent trip to London — and found it gone.
M enemsha was all hunkered down
’Twas quiet like all Chilmark town
In winter when it’s cold — and snow
Is falling as all folk do know
And Dutcher Dock is still — except
For Scott McDowell who’s so deft
At making copper fish to sell
For he must pound and tap as well
To make his fish come out just right.
His cod and sole are quite a sight.
Few boats are tied up at the dock
And so it came as quite a shock
To Santa Claus to see bright lights
Beverly Sills, coloratura soprano, devoted supporter of the arts and longtime Vineyard seasonal resident, died on Monday at her home in New York city of lung cancer. Ms. Sills, who was 78, was the wife of the late Peter B. Greenough, a retired financial writer for the Boston Globe, who died last September.
Nancy Coles Hegeman Stephens, a fourth-generation East Chop seasonal resident, and for more than 50 years the Gazette's East Chop correspondent, died Jan. 14 in Charlotte, N.C. after a long illness. She was the wife of the late Page P. Stephens.
Tisbury's John G. Rogers Is Dead at 76; Was Best Friend to Vineyard's Animals
By PHYLLIS MERAS
John G. Rogers of Vineyard Haven, audio engineer, former Tisbury animal control officer and longtime Steamship Authority employee, died unexpectedly on Sunday at the Martha's Vineyard Hospital. He was 76.