In 2002 Della Hardman told the Vineyard Gazette: “When I retired I could have stayed in West Virginia, or gone wherever, somewhere, anywhere, but I chose to come to Martha’s Vineyard. And I didn’t plan to come and sit. I planned to be involved.
It takes just one person to inspire a community. That is the legacy of the late Della Brown Hardman, educator, artist, writer, mother and friend. As residents and visitors in Oak Bluffs have witnessed since Della’s death in 2005, an inspired community can keep alive such a legacy through continued effort.
The annual Della Hardman Day celebration of the arts is tomorrow in Ocean Park. This will be the eighth year that a neighborhood, town and Island gather to celebrate art and life, Della-style.
What follows are the three winning essays from the annual Della Hardman essay contest at the Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School. Students were asked to write opinion pieces about the use of digital devices at the high school. Winning essayists will be recognized at the annual Della Hardman Day event in Oak Bluffs on Saturday, July 28. The Gazette publishes the winning essays annually in advance of the daylong event which celebrates the arts and literature each year on the last Saturday in July.
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By BRIAN HURLEY
The painted wooden sign resting on the base of the podium in Ocean Park read Savor the Moment, and when celebrated poet Sonia Sanchez stepped to the microphone to begin her program during Della Hardman Day on Saturday, it was impossible to imagine doing anything else. Words on a page are poor conveyors of the rhythms and intonations of Mrs. Sanchez’s commanding voice, which has been holding audiences rapt for decades.
Della Hardman had the soul of a West Virginian, the heart of a Vineyarder and an unparalleled curiosity for life. This weekend, the sixth annual Della Hardman Day event will celebrate what Mrs. Hardman encouraged everyone around her to do: savor the moment.
Della Hardman, an artist, educator, writer and columnist, was a pillar of service in the Vineyard community.
She died in December of 2005, but not before enjoying Oak Bluffs’ first Della Brown Hardman Day in July of that year.
“We didn’t realize it would be her last year,” Ms. Hardman’s daughter, Andrea Taylor, said of the first event. “It was a wonderful celebration. A great way for her to look back on her career.”