On October 9, community members joined us to celebrate Rev. Cathlin Baker and Bill Eville as they received our 42^nd Annual Creative Living Award. The Grange Hall was full of family, Vineyard Gazette staffers past and present, members of First Congregational Church of West Tisbury, and the couple’s friends from many paths across the Island – all to celebrate how Cathlin and Bill contribute to the quality of people’s lives on the Vineyard. 

As Executive Director Paul Schulz, noted in his welcome to the guests, “Together, they remind us that community is not something that just exists. It’s something we build, word by word, deed by deed, and week by week.”

Cathlin and Bill chose their friends cartoonist Paul Karasik, longtime Vineyard Gazette editor Julie Wells, First Congregational Church of West Tisbury Council Chair Sydney Mullen, and former Vineyard Gazette news editor Noah Asimow to offer short tributes. Each spoke to different facets of Cathlin and Bill as individuals and to the collective power of their partnership. 

“When we are with Bill and Cathlin, we are reminded that gratitude is what keeps us human,” Paul Karasik noted. “Both Bill and Cathlin in their own ways, in their own fields, sow the seeds of gratitude.”

“This shared professional voice: Bill the poetry, Cathlin providing the urgency, both of them providing the empathy, is why they’re winning this award together,” Noah Asimow reflected. 

We are grateful to Cathlin and Bill for the many ways in which they create communities of care on the Vineyard. To get a sense of how many others share that gratitude, please read the Vineyard Gazette’s story about our event, published in the October 11, 2025 edition.