If you’ve ever visited Nantucket, it’s easy to get the impression that it’s an idyllic place. Combine historic buildings, an island setting and a ban on chain stores in its downtown, it’s like the platonic ideal of a storied New England destination. It’s also seen, in recent years, an uptick in both sales of luxury homes and efforts to create more egalitarian housing.
This summer, though, Nantucket’s vibes have been a little different than they are most years. In a new dispatch for Air Mail, William D. Cohan outlined a season in which “some of the well-off of Nantucket finally seem to be losing their minds.” As Cohan reports, one side effect of this has been the local health department setting up a plan to test sewage to get a sense of the drug use on the island.
Local news outlet the Nantucket Current has had some interesting scoops this summer, including one story about a pilot who recently received a lifetime ban from Nantucket Airport. According to the Current‘s David Creed, the pilot’s offenses included “taxiing across a grass island on the airfield, and urinating on the airfield in front of three airport employees.” There’s also the matter of multiple bomb threats called in to Main Street businesses earlier this month.
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A strange but compelling piece of historyCohan runs down several other alarming happenings on the island, ranging from illicit removal of trees to widespread income inequality. “[I]t has been getting harder to go on pretending things haven’t changed,” Cohan writes. The ferry ride to Nantucket can leave travelers feeling like they’re on their way to a place where existing concerns and tensions no longer apply — but reporting like this is a reminder that that isn’t the case.
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