It’s Sunday morning at the dump, and more and more people are arriving to browse through all the donated stuff at the Dumptique.
Men’s suits by Brooks Brothers and Michael Kors, sparkly co*cktail dresses, designer shoes, basketballs, puzzles, suitcases, dishes, and shelf after shelf of books. Some of it is high-end treasure, much of it is not.
Everything is free—no money changes hands. People donate what they don’t want, then others load up their castaways. For many people, it’s about community.
“We call it the Church of the Dumptique,” said Betsy Carnie, who volunteers at the swap-shop in a wooden shack on Sunday mornings, where regulars include a former Secret Service agent and a couple who met on the island’s nude beach.
“It’s the real Martha’s Vineyard,” said Rebecca Potter, a volunteer on the committee that runs the place, as she hung up newly-donated shirts. “It’s a different scene than most people think.”
This 20-mile-long island, just off Cape Cod, has long been synonymous with the rich and famous. Jackie Kennedy once lived here. While in the White House, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama vacationed on the Vineyard. Now the Obamas still spend part of the year in a waterfront mansion they bought for almost $12 million.
In the summer, the island is thick with celebrities, including Jake Gyllenhaal, Bill Murray, Larry David, Michael J. Fox, Oprah, Spike Lee, and Reese Witherspoon.
In July and August, the population swells to 200,000, many of whom own gorgeous houses hidden away on private beaches and wooded hills. Seasonal renters routinely pay $10,000 or $20,000 a week for waterfront houses. The airport is jammed with private jets.
But Martha’s Vineyard is a far more complicated and nuanced place than its reputation as an elite playground. It has a year-round population of about 20,000—teachers, nurses, plumbers, shopkeepers, fishermen, artists, writers and others who keep the place running and endure North Atlantic winters that can be dark, cold and long.
The island’s affordable housing shortage is brutal, and young people and workers are often forced to hop from one temporary house-sit to another – or leave for more opportunities on the mainland. That creates friction between full-time residents struggling to find places to live and “wash-ashores” whose summer homes sit empty for much of the year.
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The Dumptique is something everyone agrees about, a cheery blend of the island’s glitz and its backbone. It’s located down a small direct road near fields of grazing horses. All kinds of people come here looking for a find.
“Everything I’m wearing is from here!” said Dana Nunes, a model and waitress, proudly showing off her red-and-black jacket and blue jeans.
Even her tote bag, ready to load up with new finds, came from here.
Her partner, Edward Sussman, a retired forensic pathologist, said he has made friends at the Dumptique.“We have many dinners with people we met here,” he said.
Nothing from the Dumptique is wasted. It is either re-used or dropped into a Red Cross bin nearby, where clothing, books and other materials are shredded for insulation and other useful materials.
On a cool Sunday morning in May, the island where Steven Spielberg filmed Jaws fifty years ago this summer was showing the first signs of the high season ahead. More cars with out of state plates were arriving on the ferry and the Seafood Shanty and other restaurants were opening up.
Traffic at the Dumptique was picking up, too.
“We come here for community and we come here to witness the lifecycle of things that go out and come back,” said Carnie, who sometimes sees the same item come back more than once.
“To me it’s the story of the connection of humans. These are things that bring us together.”
She said some out-of-state visitors to the Dumptique have been inspired to start the same kind of shop back home.
Carnie wore a cashmere sweater with a small hole, where a moth appeared to have nibbled.
“People don’t bat an eye around here about that,” she said, poking at the hole. “I think that’s why rich people started coming here. It is so down to Earth. People want to be part of that. And we’ve got some nice stuff in here, too!”
As she spoke, she happily picked up a neatly folded stack of clothes that Joan Caley, 83, had just carried in from her car.
Caley said it was nice to think someone else will use her donations, and it’s fun to pick something up: “On Tuesday, I got two blouses.”
Caley said the Dumptique may have been designed to help those on a tight budget when it opened twenty years ago, but now everyone goes. It’s a destination, a social event, a Vineyard tradition.
“Anyone want a bookcase?” said a woman who drove up in an SUV.
It was gone in a second, loaded into another car.
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