HARWICH — There are changes coming to the former Irish Pub property adjacent to the Herring River in West Harwich. The pub is gone, and selectmen have approved a seasonal liquor license for a new restaurant and inn, the Summer House Cafe. The owners of the new business are planning to establish an inn and full restaurant in the 220-year-old Captain Caleb Chase house, and say they are committed to working with ...

HARWICH – Monomoy Regional High School girls tennis coach Bill Burke couldn’t have predicted how well his team would perform this spring. After all, Burke didn’t even know some of the players a couple months ago. “We had some players that I didn’t even know existed that came out for the team,” he said. “Some freshmen and some juniors that came out of nowhere and brought a lot of talent and a lot of spirit. Thi...

The schedule is set, the overwhelming majority of COVID-19 restrictions have been lifted and the countdown to the start of the Cape Cod Baseball League season is underway. The excitement surrounding the league’s return to play has been boiling for more than a year, and it’s finally almost time to play ball once again. “We’re very excited and very anxious to get back and open up the season this year,” said H...

FALMOUTH – It hasn’t been the easiest season for the Nauset Regional High School’s girls lacrosse team. The team’s head coach, Heather Stevens, had an idea that the team might experience some growing pains after a handful of seniors decided to opt out of playing after their entire junior season was canceled due to COVID-19. Although there have been struggles — the Warriors fell to 0-8 following Thursday’s 1...

Cape Rep Theatre is preparing to kick off its 36th season with a return to live performance under the summer stars. The fun will start on July 6 and will include two outdoor summer shows on Cape Rep's new outdoor stage, as well as children's outdoor programming throughout July and August. After the year we've had, what better way to return to live theater than with a comedy? How about a comedy about live thea...

If you love podcasts and are fascinated by sharks, you're in luck. The new Gills Talk podcast shines t he light of science on Cape Cod's most charismatic predatory marine megafauna. Living up to its motto, “Smart about Sharks,” Gills Talk is a natural extension of Gills Club, the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy's  STEM-based education initiative dedicated to connecting young shark enthusiasts...

Close to 15 years ago, after researcher Owen Nichols’ first season working with a fishing family, he came up with what he thought was an impressive chart that drew direct connections between wind direction, water temperature and the presence of squid. He remembers being excited it to share it with Ernie Eldredge of Chatham Fish Weirs Enterprises, whose fish weirs he was using to study squid. Eldredge looked at...

Chatham voters head to Veterans Field on June 12 for the annual town meeting, delayed a month due to the pandemic. Scheduled to begin at noon under (hopefully) sunny skies, the session includes a number of significant measures in the 64-article warrant. Among them are nearly two dozen requests for Community Preservation Act funding (half held over from 2020), and a final resolution to the long quest to build a ne...

Plastic Bottle Ban A Moral Imperative Editor: On behalf of the Earth-Honoring Faith Committee of St. Christopher’s Episcopal Church, I am writing in support of the proposed commercial single-use plastic water bottle ban in Chatham. We at St. Christopher’s are deeply concerned about the deterioration in the quality of the town’s natural environment caused in recent years by the steadily increasing volume ...

What would it be like to start your first business, a home health care business, during a pandemic? Karen L. Warren of Harwich and Jean C. Copeland of Chatham found out when they opened Quality Homecare Cape Cod, LLC one year ago, on June 1. “Mostly it made us nervous,” Copeland says. “We had to have a COVID policy.” They have continuously educated themselves on the CDC’s ever-changing guidelines. And they ...

ORLEANS — Leslie Fields must have a great tennis game. On June 1, the Woods Hole Group project manager for the proposed Nauset Estuary dredging project returned service and volleyed calmly with members of the Nauset Estuary Stakeholder Group. The shots coming her way during a two-hour workout ranged from easy lobs from some Orleans representatives to overhead smashes from some Eastham appointees. The subj...

ORLEANS — You might say Lisa Simundson caught a wave and never let go. From living in Florida to moving to the Cape a decade ago, the new executive director of the Orleans Chamber of Commerce has spent her career writing about and promoting the special merits of coastal communities. “I grew up the Florida way,” she said last week. “You’re outside 365 days a year. If you don’t go to the beach today, you go...

ORLEANS — Ember Gardens and b\well finished first and second in the select board’s composite ranking of applications for the town’s two available retail marijuana licenses. Seaside Joint Venture was ranked third, Dune Wellness fourth, and Strain LLC fifth. Last night (June 2), the board was scheduled to vote on extending two invitations to negotiate host community agreements, a crucial step in moving forward...

Joëlle Saint Hilare Phillips of West Harwich and wife of Paul Phillips for 46 years, passed on April 17, 2021. Joëlle was born March 30, 1933 in La Creuse, France. She moved to the United States in 1955 where she remained for the rest of her life. Joëlle lived and travelled the country extensively, creating lifetime relationships along the way. California, New Mexico, Vermont and Cape Cod were especially dear to ...

Winifred Riggs Portenoy passed away peacefully at her home in Chatham on May 17th, the 75th anniversary of her marriage to the late Norman Portenoy.  She led a long and fulfilling life as a wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, noted philanthropist and foundation chairman, and influential member of many arts and civic boards on Cape Cod and in Washington, D.C., her home for five decades.      Winnie, as s...