Cats Of Marthas Vineyard

Our passions have a way of doing that for us: extending our lives In 1971, a father and son ventured out of their apartment in New Jersey to the Island of Martha' s Vineyard to try their hand at surfcasting. That trip began a life of Spring trips to the waters' s edge in search of bluefish and striped bass. Fifty years later, Mike Carotta takes readers along for thirty straight nights and days of fishing. This is not a How To book. It does not contain the secrets to a fantastic fishing career. Rather, hard fishing has a way of revealing lessons from the shore and the people who gather there— binding together strangers in conversations and gestures, failures and successes, new learnings, and, eventually, creating old friends. Through it all, more than fish are caught— and shared. The result is a profound collection of essays on life with some notes from the trade filtered in. Join Mike on his pilgrimage back to where the distance between heaven and earth gets a little thinner and the real "keepers" of the trip go far beyond the fish on the end of the line. "I am not a good surf fisherman. There are no helpful fishing hints here. This is a collection of recollection: stories of saltwater characters, occurrences, and conversations. Like stars in the night sky, they are best enjoyed when you get some distance from the lights of other stuff." &– Excerpt from A Long Cast

The focus is on Martha’s Vineyard but the information, fishing tips, and stories about Island characters—Bob “Hawkeye” Jacobs jumping off Memorial Wharf to unsnag an albie he hooked—will sound familiar to anyone who has spent time in a community of fishermen. This informative and fun read answers the questions asked in local tackle shops, including the best spots to catch a striped bass on a fly rod—Lobsterville Beach—and rigging tackle for blues, fluke, black sea bass, false albacore, and bonito. Spin fishing, bottom fishing, and fly fishing are all covered. This book follows the island fishing seasons: rods appear on island trucks in April, a sign that schoolies have arrived, and they do not begin to disappear until the venerable Bass and Bluefish Derby, five weeks of single-minded pursuit of fish, ends in October. And there are tips on looking and talking the part . . . “handy phrases include any reference to a falling or rising tide and a rock, any rock, as long as you refer to it with a sense of authority so that the other person is unwilling to ask which rock for fear of seeming like a novice.” Martha’s Vineyard Fish Tales is a“how to” book that flows with the character and personality of a fishing-obsessed island off the coast of Massachusetts.

Celebrated local historian Thomas Dresser unearths the little-known stories that laid the foundations for the community of Martha's Vineyard. Behind the mansions and presidential vacations of Martha's Vineyard hide the lost stories and forgotten events of small-town America. What was the island's role in the Underground Railroad? Why do chickens festoon Nancy Luce's grave? And how did the people of the Vineyard react in 1923 when the rum running ship John Dwight sank with the island's supply of liquor aboard? Delve deep below the surface of history to discover the origin and meaning of local place names and the significance of beloved landmarks.

In "Shooting Star," ninety-two-year-old poet Victoria Trumbull becomes embroiled in controversy at the community theater on Martha' s Vineyard. The new artistic director has announced plans to replace local amateur talent with off-Island professionals, and the cast and crew react murderously. Victoria intended the theater' s current production, her adaptation of "Frankenstein," by Mary Shelley, to debunk the common farcical movie-monster interpretation by returning to Shelley' s original serious commentary on the Industrial Revolution. However, after the night of the dress rehearsal, Victoria loses control over the production, and her drama begins to take a strange course. On that night, the eight-year-old boy playing the part of Frankenstein' s young brother disappears, and before a search can begin, a killer strikes. The Vineyard' s police forces mobilize for an Island-wide search. In the original story of Frankenstein, the boy is the first victim of the monster, and Victoria fears that a copycat killer is following her playscript. She determines to find the missing boy and track down the killer before more deaths occur. Along with familiar Island characters from her previous books, the author introduces a cast of new and often eccentric players. "Shooting Star," the seventh book in the Martha' s Vineyard mystery series, explores the rich setting of the Island that author Cynthia Riggs knows well, from the rose-covered Dukes County jail on Edgartown' s Main Street to the quaint ferry terminal in Oak Bluffs. It' s a delightful read that both fans and newcomers to the series will be sure toenjoy.

The Roaring Twenties were filled with a range of events, experiences, fears, laws and advances that impacted Martha's Vineyard. Island residents were involved in rumrunning. Dozens died of the Spanish Flu. Women voted on Island. Dorothy West joined the Harlem Renaissance. Immigration from the Azores slowed, and airplanes landed in Katama. Tourism blossomed and business boomed. Local author Thomas Dresser shares the back story and the import of this remarkable decade and how it has shaped Vineyarders.