Sending a message in a bottle is always a risky thing to do. The excitement about thinking whether or not you will get a response, and just how far that response will come from, is enough to provoke people into dropping letters into the ocean. More often than not, they go unanswered, but for these lucky people, they were in for a surprise years after sending their messages out to sea…
A Classic Scene
You know those classic, heartbreaking scenes: someone stranded on an island, or desperate to send a message to a lost love, scratches a hasty note in a bottle, corks it, and tosses it into the ocean, never to be seen again…
Out Of A Movie
It makes it hard to believe that finding messages in bottles is something that happens in real life, until one boy stumbled across something unbelievable on the shores of Australia…
One Particular Message
In July 2019, 13-year-old Jyah Elliot discovered a message in a bottle washed up in some sand dunes on the shores of South Australia. He was on a fishing expedition with his father. He opened the letter and read a note from a young British boy named Paul Gilmore…
Help Find Paul Gilmore
Going off of Paul’s name and the date the message was sent, Sue McBeth, a genealogist, reached out to Elliot’s family and said she could help find the man who’d written this letter as a young boy…
Searching Public Records
The trick to finding Paul (top left) was to manually search a massive archive of un-digitized historical public records. Sue searched births, deaths, and marriage records, property listings and the electoral roll from Australia to the UK. Eventually, she tracked down the Gilmore family…
The Story Behind The Message
50 years ago, Paul threw a message into the Indian Ocean while his family was overseas moving from England to Australia…
About The Gilmore Family
The Gilmore family boarded the TSS Fairstar, headed to Australia. They lived there until 1973, and then moved back to England. Paul’s sister, Annie, recalls Paul writing letters and putting them on bottles while they were on the ship. She believes he sent about six…
A Trans-Continental Move
The Gilmore’s father decided to move the family from Europe to Australia in hopes of a better life. Paul’s brother David said their father had had too many winters working outside, building houses, and was told that Australia was the land of opportunity. While David was only 4 at the time, today he recognized Paul’s handwriting in the viral photo of the message in a bottle…
Paul Today
When news of the letter went viral, it seemed the world knew what was going on except Paul. He currently is on a cruise and cannot be reached. So Jyah waits eagerly for a response…
An Eager Discovery
Jyah’s mother Carla said he was so excited when he found the letter, though he initially thought maybe it was fake. After discovering Paul Gilmore he was real, Jyah wrote back. He mailed his letter the very same day he found the bottle…
Happy Childhood Memories
The Gilmores recall fond memories of their time in Australia, and finding the letter reminds them of the adventurous childhood all three children had. When they arrived, the family of five lived in a caravan in their aunt’s backyard in Victoria.
Waiting For A Response
Though it’s unlikely Jyah will receive an answer from Paul because he has since moved from the return address, it is likely that the Internet will bring these two together. Though it seems remarkable, there are several instances of this happening to others in the past…
From Lake Michigan To Florida
Gary Henrickson of Santa Rosa, Florida, found a message in a bottle from Michigan that dates back to 1995. Over Memorial Day Weekend of 2019, the bottle washed ashore and Henrickson brought it home.
The Author Wasn’t Interested In Sharing The Story
When Henrickson called the phone number listed in the note, a nice man picked up, but said it was a different time in his life and he wasn’t interested in sharing his name or story with the news.
A Lesson In Morality
A Newburyport man reflects on the message in a bottle he threw into the sea more than two decades ago. He indeed got a reply, all the way from Scotland…
“All You Did Was Litter”
Matt Rhoades said that the discovery of the bottle prompted him to take stock of his life during the time the bottle was floating. “My sisters have made it a point to call and tell me several times that all I did at the end of the day was pollute.”
Should Have Been More Creative
Matt also said he wishes he’d thought to be a little more creative, and say something about himself or the time. Instead, all he wrote was “Hello, my name is Matt Rhoades. Please write back.” You were a kid, it’s alright.
Another Rare Australia Find
In 1886, sailors on a German barque called Paula tossed a gin bottle with a message inside into the waters hundreds of miles off the western coast of Australia…
The Oldest Message In A Bottle To Date
130 years later, a Perth resident stumbled across the bottle on Australia’s Wedge Island. Australian, German, and Dutch researches worked together to verify the note’s authenticity, confirming that it was real and as old as the date inside says it is.
Not An SOS Or A Love Letter
Thousands of bottles were thrown into the world’s oceans from German ships, each containing a form on which the captain would write the date it was jettisoned, the exact coordinates at the time, the name of the ship, its home port and travel route.
A Dedication In A Bottle
A bottle with a photo of a mother’s deceased daughter was recovered on a beach in Italy. Samantha Leczkowski was killed at the 2017 Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, and her mother sent a dedication out to sea. It was found by a man cleaning a beach in the Southern region of Apulia.
From the West Indies To Texas
This bottle traveled nearly 2,400 miles in a year, and a Texas man found a note that wished whoever came across it “good fortune.” James Howie Hill was beachcombing when he came across the bottle, and he emailed the couple who wrote the note.
A 4-Year-Old Author
Taylor, 4, put a selfie in the bottle with her dad’s phone number and the message: “If you find this picture, please respond with a name of your country and a picture.” The reply she received was magical…
From Spain To Russia
And 20 days after she tossed the bottle in the water in Santa Susanna, near Barcelona, her dad, Ritchie, got a text from a couple named Sasha and Alex. They said they found the bottle in a Moscow river and sent a snap of Taylor’s note. They signed it: “From Russia with love.”
Richmond Children Connect With Author
Six-year-old Landon Pearson, his brother and a neighbor were exploring the area around Marker 107, a seafood restaurant in Richmond Hill, when they found the bottle near a tree in the marsh…
Facebook Helps Find Chad
It took less than an hour for Chad to be located after he posted about the bottle, something that shocked Jeff. According to Chad, he wrote the message over 30 years ago…
The group of boys thought it was a treasure map, initially, but it took an explanation from Landon’s mother to let them know what they really had. Inside of the bottle was a napkin with faded writing. It was a greeting from a man whose name was Chad, asking that if the bottle was found to return it to him. After that, a piece of an address was legible with a city and state at the end: LaGrange, Georgia.
21 Years In Lake Michigan
Mason Bentley, 11, of Greendale, found this message in this bottle on the Lake Michigan shoreline of his grandparents’ house in Oostburg. The bottle was tossed in the lake by a teenage passenger on the SS Badger ferry in 1998…
Finding The Author
The letter was written by Marshall Fanslau of Two Rivers and in the note he said, “Whoever finds this, write back to me. Tell me where it is and when you find this.” However, it seems the eager note slipped Marshall’s mind when he was contacted present day by Mason…
Written On The Back Of A Placemat
“Come on, are you serious?” he said when Mason’s family called. “I don’t recall throwing it in the water. I don’t even recall writing the letter.” What he does remember are the trips his family would make on the Badger, including the red-eye crossing from midnight to 4 a.m. His best guess is that the bottle was sent afloat while most passengers dozed on that journey.