While reading a series of Gazette editorials ruminating on the New Year over the years, the eye catches on one written in 1942 in the middle of World War II. The editorial is somber, and talks of the nation’s sacrifice and of the Island men overseas in the thick of the fighting. But it also goes on to talk of economic worries on the Island. There was fear that what was left of the vacationing public would not visit the Island due to rumors of potential dangers and a possible target due to its isolated location.

What is most interesting about the editorial is not the level of concern over loss of tourism, always an issue in a resort community, but the duality of the Vineyard as a place that is part of the larger picture even as it tries to be its own entity. This is as true today on the cusp of 2015 as it was back in 1942. The illusion that national and international headlines are comfortably out of range of the Island more often than not comes home to roost. Unfortunately, war is not just a thing of the past, and the Island still sends its men, and women, too, to fight overseas. But it also hosts wounded veterans from around the country during the Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby to help them heal their spirits.

Nationally, racial profiling and tensions between minority communities and the police went from simmering to boiling this fall. Far from Ferguson and Brooklyn, our Island community often seems like a haven from urban ills, but as Erik Blake, Oak Bluffs chief of police, said in an interview this week, “It’s a tough thing to admit — that everyone has biases. How do you know what your biases are and how do you react?”

On New Year’s Day 2015, Chief Blake and others planned to march in solidarity with the national movement to end racial profiling, and also to demonstrate that all lives matter. We applaud the chief and other organizers for raising awareness around a very complex issue.

In the arena of climate change and the natural world, the Vineyard is in some ways out in front, literally, of the issues. Sea level rise and the effects of extreme weather are not mere concepts here as we watch the sea devour our shorelines.

The Ebola crisis seemed a distant threat, even when it arrived on the mainland. Then we discovered at least one of our own has been working on the front lines of the epidemic in Liberia, and we were impressed by Nora Love’s humanity and bravery.

Earlier this year we learned a major breakthrough in Alzheimer’s research was made possible in part by the financial efforts of a Vineyard family.

And oddly enough, we discovered this year that the Island could lead the way in the potentially controversial process of de-extinction as the heath hen is being considered a good candidate for a second life, possibly taking place on our shores.

The world has always been a much smaller place than we like to imagine, and each year it appears smaller still as the connective tissue of global issues reveals once more that no person and no place stand alone.

As the Island enters 2015, our community must begin to grapple with major issues including lack of affordable housing, income inequality, how to care for an aging population and threats to our coastal ponds, to name a few. Most of these are issues that are also on the national radar, of course, but the fact that the Vineyard is also a lovely vacation destination doesn’t exempt us from having to focus locally on the real problems we share.

The 1942 New Year’s editorial went on to say, “We have here a sanctuary, just as we have had a sanctuary in the past, and the people who love the Vineyard or who seek this kind of peace for respite from heavy duties and cares must not be dissuaded from coming.”

We are pleased that the Vineyard continues to be this place of peace for so many of our visitors and residents. And we are equally pleased that at the dawn of 2015 it feels like the Island is also a place that resonates on the world’s stage.