Lighthouses go green

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Th East Chop Lighthouse is shining a green light in honor of Children's Mental Health Awareness Week. – Lexi Pline

Throughout this week, the East Chop Lighthouse, West Chop Lighthouse, and Edgartown Lighthouse towers have been lit up in green light in honor of Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week.

Martha’s Vineyard Community Services (MVCS), in collaboration with the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Cape Cod and The Islands, the Coast Guard, and the Harbor View Hotel have come together to help shine a light on National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Week.

“Nothing is more important than our children’s health,” Lisa Belcastro, NAMI MV Coordinator said in the release. “Health isn’t limited to physical health. A healthy mind is just as essential as a healthy body, sometimes more so. In this time of social distancing, mental health has never been more important.”

This week is observed each year in May as part of Mental Health Awareness Month to raise awareness about the importance of children’s mental health and how vital positive mental health is to a child’s development. 

“We truly believe the lighthouses are symbols of hope and positivity, and now, more than ever, people of all ages are in greater need of both. The more we talk about the many facets of mental health, especially in young people, the more we can break down the stigma associated with it,” Katy Fuller, Director of Operations and Business Development at Martha’s Vineyard Museum, said in the release.

11 COMMENTS

  1. Great idea, worthwhile cause. As a blue water sailor, I am not in favor of changing lights in light houses. Can we find another edifice or symbol to use?

  2. a well intentioned bad idea. They could have illuminated the lighthouses with green flood lights instead.

    • Aye, but if the the west chop light is also green a vessel steaming SE, and not seeing east chop might just leave west chop to port – even a landlubber can figure out what happens next.

  3. This really bothers me. Perhaps I am over reacting, but lighthouses are for navigation, “symbols of hope and positivity”…that just does not cut it with me. Can we just leave our lighthouses alone? I spent a lot of time in utter blackness, watching for the lighthouses as means of navigation, nothing else. As i wrote, perhaps I am over reacting and am just an old fuddy duddy.

  4. Hanley, I am so amazed at this, I cannot adequately express my feelings about this. Lighthouses are for navigation not virtue signaling. I want it stopped in its tracks and I do not want this to happen again. Strong language I know but as a sailor who has depended on lighthouses I am sick at heart.

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