’Twas the week before Christmas, the elves worked in shifts

At generous Grace Church wrapping thousands of gifts.

The children we served totaled 425

With Barbie and Batman and Baby Alive

The ones we cared for without using their name,

Last year, added up to exactly the same.

From the Vineyard Gazette edition of Dec. 23, 1909:

The “corner store” in Edgartown is the center of attraction for all shoppers just now. Everybody is enthusiastic over their magnificent stock of Christmas goods, the largest, finest and handsomest in this portion of the Western Hemisphere. If you once permit yourself to see their goods you will be sure to leave your money with them.

This afternoon at four o’clock the bonitos take to the water in a swim meet at the YMCA. The bonitos are a swim club for children ages six to twelve that introduces young minnows to competitive swimming. Not so much concerned with fast times and medals, the club appears populated by otters rather than the ferocious local game fish. The kids frolic in and out of the pool, their wriggling bodies representative of a time when standing still was the hardest test of all.

A budding dispute between the Boch family and the town of Edgartown over whether the Bochs may land a helicopter at their down-harbor estate now appears to be headed to superior court.

The town zoning board of appeals last week upheld the decision of the town building inspector to issue a cease and desist to Barbara Boch. Helicopter landings on private property are not allowed under Edgartown zoning bylaws.

Some Jews celebrate Hanukkah and only Hanukkah, and my red-and-green tasseled hat goes off to them. But others of us come from either mixed heritage or mixed messages; we celebrate Christmas and Hanukkah with widely divergent measures of each.

Children are everything to this island. It doesn’t matter if there are just one or two, or as many as eight or nine, a place is set at every table at every meal for every one of them, no matter who their parents are. There are always eyes swelling with love and protection, ready at any moment to jump in and become a real pain. The island kids think they are free spirits. True, they have no limits, no traffic, no extortion, no bullies and no boundaries except the sea and only two rules. The first is that no one goes onto a dock without a life jacket until they’ve learned to swim.