In the Gazette newsroom, we all knew the stories. And over the course of about a year, Bill Eville, managing editor of the Gazette, shared in intimate essays with the rest of the Island community the challenges of raising two small children, Hardy and Pickle, and supporting his wife, Cathlin, through diagnosis, surgery, chemotherapy and radiation treatments for breast cancer.

The federal government formally declared the Gay Head Light surplus property Thursday, clearing the way for the town of Aquinnah to take ownership of the lighthouse which is now critically endangered due to erosion.

The General Services Administration posted the notice Thursday, making the lighthouse surplus property. Aquinnah voters have already agreed that the town will apply to take ownership.

In the summer of 1971 Michael Pollan’s pig Kosher won first prize at the Martha’s Vineyard Agricultural Fair. But her glory was short-lived.

Folksinger James Taylor had also entered his pig, Mona, at the fair. She, too, won a blue ribbon. Mona, a very large pig, was made famous by a celebrated photograph of Mr. Taylor and the pig walking on his property in West Tisbury.

At Stannard Farms in West Tisbury, Lisa Fisher is using good bugs to combat the bad ones. Peering into her green beans, she pulled aside heart-shaped leaves. She was looking for a mahogany-colored beetle a little larger than a ladybug, called the bean beetle.

When Eric Asimov visits the Island for the book festival it will be his first time on the Vineyard in 30 years. His last trip was marked by trying his first farm-fresh egg. He was in college at the time, sleeping on a friend’s floor, and for breakfast one morning they went to the neighbor’s next door to fetch the eggs for breakfast.

It’s time for tap to take its seat at the contemporary dance table, and it starts in Chilmark. Artists colony the Yard began its second annual Tap the Yard festival on Thursday night, July 25, bringing together a host of rhythm and percussive-based dancers that go beyond the standard tap steps to include hiphop, Irish step dancing, body percussion and modern dance.