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The
Martha's Vineyard Times is a weekly publication.
January
20 - January 26, 2005 Edition
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EDITORIAL Let's reconsider January 20, 2005 The matter of the name for the new double-ended ferry, now under construction and destined to replace Islander on the Vineyard run next year, was among the issues raised this week at a public forum for Vineyarders to consider Steamship Authority affairs. Carole Fligor of Edgartown did us all a service when she asked if there could be more thought given to the new vessel's name. Late last year, Steamship Authority members, at the urging of Kathryn Roessel, then the Vineyard member, agreed to name the new vessel Island Home. Ms. Roessel, who died November 27, proposed the name. Certainly, there are very good reasons why the question of the new vessel's name should be revisited. First, and perhaps foremost, the name Ms. Roessel selected, and the members approved, had not been vetted in even the most rudimentary sense by Vineyarders. There was no announcement that a name was under consideration. There was no consideration by the members of, for example, a list of possible names. There was no informal, limited invitation to Vineyarders to participate in the naming. There was certainly no formal, extensive effort to gauge Vineyard opinions as to possible names. The name Island Home just happened, without us. By itself, this needs correcting. In addition, the name Island Home has a historical antecedent. The boatline's first Island Home was a much-beloved side-wheeler whose long life spanned the second half of the 19th century. Like Islander, Island Home was Spartan, maybe a little homely, but she was a workhorse, and a nimble one. (In that way she differed significantly from Islander, which for all her virtues cannot be called nimble.) Unfortunately, Island Home was beloved at Nantucket, for which distant, Nantucket Sound community she served as a mainstay. During this same period, Vineyarders depended on several vessels, including Monohansett - the vessel on which President Ulysses S. Grant, after visiting the Vineyard, departed for New Bedford in 1874. Paul C. Morris and Joseph F. Morin report, “September 5, 1855, was truly a great day for the supporters of steamboating on Nantucket. The sparkling, new Island Home, with flags flying as she rounded Brant Point, steamed majestically into the island harbor. She proudly paddled twice around to give the crowd assembled on shore a chance to look her over, and as she headed into her wharf the National Brass Band of Boston put forth with 'several national airs.' Everybody was excited and happy - quite a change indeed from island attitudes toward previous steamboats.” She was a Nantucket vessel, and the island home referred to in her name was Nantucket, not the Vineyard. Of course, that fact does not disqualify the name, but further consideration by Vineyarders might raise possibilities that charm a Vineyard ear, and a new vessel - named West Chop perhaps, or Menemsha, or Aquinnah, or Naushon, or Nobska, or Vineyard Sound, or, well, you think of something - might begin what we hope will be a long, trouble-free, efficient, and safe life with a proper Vineyard pedigree. And when she arrives from her Louisiana builder's yard, maybe we will be excited and happy, and there'll be a brass band putting forth airs for a new ferry with a name that means something distinctly Vineyard to all of us. |
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©The
Martha's Vineyard Times 2004 - www.mvtimes.com
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