As she was updated on preparations for the 30th annual Tisbury town picnic on Memorial Day, to be held Monday from noon to 4 p.m. on 23 acres overlooking Lake Tashmoo, Isabel West thought about things.

“It’s been a pretty nifty event,” she said from her room at Long Hill assisted living in Edgartown where she now lives.

Mrs. West, who founded the town picnic, celebrated her own 96th birthday last Saturday, and the celebration continues on Memorial Day, where she will be guest of honor at the picnic.

She has passed the planning torch to the next generation, in this case, Sandra Kingston, a committee member who has chronicled the picnic’s history and Mrs. West’s role in it. Tisbury selectmen Tristan Israel, Jeff Krystal and Denys Wortman will also be on hand on Monday to flip burgers while listening to the sounds of The Flying Elbows.

“I enjoyed doing it,” a gracious Mrs. West recalled this week. “It was a responsibility but a lot of people helped over the years.”

“We always tried to put a new twist on it and hoped it would go well. Generally, it did,” she said, sitting in her sunny room, resplendent in a peach silk blouse, slacks and nicely accented fingernail polish.

Memories flooded back of the early years of the picnic. “Pat [her husband] was a great help. He was willing to do whatever needed to be done,” she recalled.

Her strong voice softened and her eyes misted as she spoke of her lifetime partnership with Pat West, who came to the Island to work with her family’s nautical supply firm as a compass maker. “He also worked on remote steering devices, don’t forget,” she said.

The annual Pat West race for gaff-rigged sailboats is held annually by the Holmes Hole Sailing Association.

“Pat was staying with my brother and working in the business. One night, my brother said he was inviting Pat to dinner. We met and that was that,” she said.

“We were married in 1938 — before the hurricane, thank goodness. That was quite a storm,” she said. The couple had a house overlooking Lake Tashmoo where they summered; they wintered in Boston where Mr. West worked in the White family business.

In 1970, the Wests moved to Tashmoo full time and several years after that Mrs. West was handed her mission at a Tashmoo family cookout. “My aunt, Mary Macy said to me, ‘Isabel, you have to keep this tradition going,’” Mrs. West said.

So the Tisbury town picnic was born.

Mrs. West missed the picnic last year, which drew 350 people, because she was recuperating from a fall.

In a nod to the Victorian era, women are encouraged to wear long skirts and big hats. “And they do,” Ms. Kingston said.

The picnic site at the head of Lake Tashmoo has a 5,000-year history dating back to an early Wampanoag story of a young boy, Tashmoo, who found a clear, sweet spring that provided a water source for his people.

In 1886, a building was constructed over the well and the water was piped to serve the growing communities of West Chop and Vineyard Haven.

Picnickers will also be able to view the old waterworks building, where a reconstruction project is under way.

Encouraging the picnic’s grande dame to attend on Monday afternoon, Ms. Kingston enumerated the social and gustatory benefits: “We’ll have watermelon and pony rides and selectmen flipping burgers,” she said.

“And awfully good water,” Mrs. West added.