The spectacular view high atop the red clay cliffs of Aquinnah, especially when the sun sets over Vineyard Sound, all but demands a cold beer or glass of wine. Now the restaurants, all two of them, in this remote village at the western tip of Martha's Vineyard are poised to oblige.
After Governor Deval Patrick's approval yesterday of the town's petition to permit beer and wine licenses, Aquinnah's 349 full-time residents will probably toast the end of its 137-year ban on alcohol sales in time for tourist season, allowing up-island residents and visitors to drink up as they drink in the Vineyard's stunning scenery.
Aquinnah has prohibited alcohol licenses since it became a town in 1870, a lingering vestige of its Puritan roots, town officials said. But in May, Town Meeting decisively voted to lift the restriction in hopes of giving the popular summer es cape an economic boost. The state Legislature gave its blessing just before Christmas, and Patrick's signature cleared the way for a New Year's Eve celebration.
"It will be great to offer people what they like," said Matthew J. Vanderhoop, owner of the Aquinnah Shop, a 120-seat seafood restaurant with a popular outdoor deck. "So many times people will come up from the beach and order a beer, and I have to disappoint them. I tell them they can bring their own, but the closest beer and bottle of wine is 40 miles there and back. After they hear, some people don't even come in."
Allowing beer and wine sales requires a second approval at a town election in May, but residents and town officials said there is no organized opposition and expect it to pass easily.
Massachusetts has 12 dry towns, and four are on Martha's Vineyard.
Only Oak Bluffs and Edgartown allow the purchase of beer and wine, though Tisbury is pursuing a home-rule petition similar to Aquinnah's that will probably come to a vote this spring.
The island's year-round population of 15,000 swells to roughly 100,000 in summer.
Vanderhoop said he has not started planning for the change, but is optimistic that the prospect of beer and a burger will boost his flagging business, which has fallen off from 125 dinners a night four years ago to 45.
Hugh Taylor, owner of the other sit-down restaurant in town, The Outermost Inn, had lobbied town officials for the change after other restaurant owners told him they were amazed he could turn a profit without alcohol sales.
"I've been living in blissful ignorance [about alcohol sales] for 17 years, but I think it will be a big help for us," said Taylor, who always reminds his patrons to bring their own adult beverages. "It sort of seems silly we're throwing away 350 empty wine bottles a week and someone else is making the money."
Taylor also said he welcomed the end of the "bring-your-own-bottle" policy, which he said was known to promote excessive imbibing from time to time.
"If you've got to pay $5 a glass for wine, your wallet will encourage prudence," he said in a telephone interview yesterday. "We're looking forward to that."
Other islanders said the change, while a convenient help to out-of-towners unaware of the ban, wouldn't mean much to locals. "I don't think it's going to have a huge impact," said Christine Rose, an Oak Bluffs resident who often has dinner in Aquinnah. "Everyone knows you make sure you get your bottle of vino before you start driving up island. This doesn't mean they are going to have a liquor store. They don't even have a store at all."
Denys Wortman, a selectman in Tisbury, said the town appears closely divided on a measure to allow beer and wine in a half-dozen restaurants.
"If I had to bet the house on it, I wouldn't bet," he said.
In Aquinnah, Gladys Widdiss, a 93-year-old lifelong resident, said allowing restaurants to sell alcohol will lead to bars and liquor stores.
"I don't think we need it," she said. "We're backing ourselves into a corner. To me, there's no upside."
