voices: the community speaks of Nantucket and GHYC

Letter to the Editor of the Inquirer and Mirror

December 4, 2003

THE PROPOSED NEW YACHT CLUB

400! What a cool, round, elegant figure that is, and why, I wondered, did it have such magic? But of course, that was the number Mrs. John Jacob Astor deemed worthy of being considered "Society", at the end of the 19th century, as that was the number of people who would fit into her ballroom. The phrase stuck, and became "THE four hundred."

How deliciously pompous, how arrogant, and how supremely vacuous. And now we might have our own gated community of four hundred special souls. Somehow, I can't see as something to be proud of. In fact I see it as irretrievable loss of a bit of sheer magic, a bit of the Old Nantucket, where one is free to walk, explore, and to go kayaking. We are told the the path to that special place will still be open to The Commoners, but if you believe that, you'll believe anything!

Everyone whom I've talked with has the feeling that it's already a fait accompli. "There's too much money behind it for it to fail", and all that kind of rot. "Besides, the Yacht Club membership is filled, and they have to go someplace!" I counter with "What if one thousand people wanted to join? Should we accomodate them too?" Of course I never get a good answer. Just a mumbled "Well, there's nothing we can do about it now".

But of course we can build even another one in Monomoy, and how about Pocomo? What a perfect setting that would be, and in the summer we could have the entire harbor filled with yachts. How elegant, and how the wealthy would love mingling strictkly with their own kind, and not being subjected to all of us mere riffraff and hoi polloi!

Other than an extremely sensible editorial, and voiced complaints and worries from immediate neighbors, I've heard no words of protest from anyone. Where is the indignation that erupted, similar to when Stop and Shop wanted to build their monstrosity on Old South Road? "Bag the Market" was the war cry, and I suggest a new one: "Sink the Yacht Club"!

Of course the builders promise that they truly want to do everything possible to not impose on us Islanders, but Ive known several other developers who made a killing by desecrating other parts of the Island with their speculative McMansions, and then left for other parts, declaring "The Island ain't what it used to be, and I'm getting out while the getting is good". This, after they helped to destroy another part of our magic place. This gang has a similar philosophy: "As long as we make money, and can sell snob appeal to four hundred families, then why should we worry about those mere Islanders?"

It was comforting to read that there's a gathering group that is finally coalescing, and wants to put a stop to this perfidy. I hope there will be more and more voices raised in protest, as the months go by.

The new golf course on the edge of 'Sconset has it's own snob appeal, where the super rich can mingle and feel comfortable with their own kind, but at least it's well hidden, fits into the landscape, and doesn't take a well used, romantic and historic place away from others, as the yacht club will.

I'm just praying that people will catch on to what they're trying to do to us, and that we have meetings, protests and votes to put a stop to it all. Just as we did to that super greedy Dutch company that owns Stop and Shop. We can show them that they can't ride roughshod over us, simply because they want to make even more money, by sacrificing an irreplaceable part of our Magic Island.

Paul O. Longenecker