Amazing Stories 3
Another very old bottle.
A message in a bottle tossed in the sea in Germany 101 years ago, believed to be the world's oldest, was presented to the sender's granddaughter, a Hamburg museum has said.
A fisherman pulled the beer bottle with the scribbled message out of the Baltic Sea off the northern city of Kiel in March, Holger von Neuhoff of the International Maritime Museum in the northern port city of Hamburg said.
Mr Von Neuhoff said researchers were able to determine, based on the address, that it was 20-year-old baker's son Richard Platz who threw the bottle in the Baltic while on a hike with a nature appreciation group in 1913.
A fisherman pulled the beer bottle with the scribbled message out of the Baltic Sea off the northern city of Kiel in March, Holger von Neuhoff of the International Maritime Museum in the northern port city of Hamburg said.
Mr Von Neuhoff said researchers were able to determine, based on the address, that it was 20-year-old baker's son Richard Platz who threw the bottle in the Baltic while on a hike with a nature appreciation group in 1913.
From Jonathan to Mary.
A 23-year-old kite surfer, Matea Medak Rezic, stumbled across a half-broken bottle while clearing debris from a Croatian beach at the mouth of the Neretva river in the southern Adriatic.
Inside the bottle was a message from Jonathan, from the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, who had written it 28 years earlier, honouring his promise to write to a woman named Mary.
The message reads: "Mary, you really are a great person. I hope we can keep in correspondence. I said I would write. Your friend always, Jonathon, Nova Scotia, 1985."
The bottle would have had to have travelled approximately 6,000 kilometres across the Atlantic Ocean, entered the Mediterranean Sea, and then drifted into the Adriatic Sea.
Jonathan and Mary's identity, and how the two knew each other, is unknown.
Inside the bottle was a message from Jonathan, from the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, who had written it 28 years earlier, honouring his promise to write to a woman named Mary.
The message reads: "Mary, you really are a great person. I hope we can keep in correspondence. I said I would write. Your friend always, Jonathon, Nova Scotia, 1985."
The bottle would have had to have travelled approximately 6,000 kilometres across the Atlantic Ocean, entered the Mediterranean Sea, and then drifted into the Adriatic Sea.
Jonathan and Mary's identity, and how the two knew each other, is unknown.
40 years of friendship
A message in a bottle hurled into the sea by an excited eight-year-old girl on a cross-Atlantic liner has led to a 40-year friendship between two families from South Wales and the USA.
The story began in July 1968, a year before man first stepped on the moon, when young Sandra Morris was sailing back to her home in Pennsylvania, USA, with her parents after a holiday to Europe.
On the deck one evening, she wrote a note on a postcard, sealed it in a wine bottle then tossed it hopefully into the heaving Atlantic waves.
Almost immediately lost in the rising and falling mass of water the neatly written note inside began: “Whoever finds this bottle please write to me at. . .”
Three months later, in October 1968, another eight-year-old girl was walking along a Welsh beach.
Rosalind Hearse, of Cornelly, on the border between Bridgend and Port Talbot, was holding the hand of her head teacher father Ken, as they walked along Morfa Beach at Margam, Port Talbot, in front of the town’s steel plant.
Rosalind spotted the bottle gleaming in the weak October sunshine and dashed to pick it up from the sand.
Now Rosalind Causey, a former nurse turned IT consultant and mother-of-two living in Suffolk, she recalled: “I took the cork from the wine bottle, replied to Sandra’s little note, and we have been in touch ever since.
“Although in these modern times we have now moved on from sea-mail to e-mail, the majority of our correspondence in the past has been via air mail.
“I used to love seeing the post man bring us a letter with a US Air Mail stamp.
“Our friendship grew through our letters as we shared amazingly parallel lives. We each have two children, a boy and girl, and our eldest were born just 10 days apart.”
Rosalind and Sandra (now Sandra Morris-Czapla) first met face-to-face in 1976, when Rosalind flew to USA for the first time to celebrate the American bicentenary.
Then in 2000, Rosalind’s two children Rhiannon, 17, and Ivan, 14, and Sandra’s two children Ahna, 15, and Austen, 17. all met for the first time.
Mrs Causey said:“The meeting came about after my two children amazingly won a trip to Disney World in a children’s design-a-Millennium flag competition.
“As soon as she heard we were visiting the USA, Sandra arranged to join us – we were lucky enough to get adjoining rooms in a hotel – and the children became firm friends.”
In April of this year Mrs Causey and her husband Mark, a chartered engineer, met up once more with Sandra and her husband Doug, who works at a golf course, in New York.
Mrs Causey said: “We persuaded Sandra to visit us (last time she was in UK was in 1977 for the Queen’s Silver Jubilee) and we have been delighted to be able to visit the spot where I found the Sandra’s message in a bottle all those years ago.”
The Causeys and the Morris-Czaplas went to Morfa Beach yesterday.
Mrs Causey said: “It was a lovely way to celebrate the 40th anniversary of a very unusual friendship.”
She added: “You often hear stories of messages in a bottle floating thousands of miles but how often do you hear of people actually meeting up a making a connection as a result?”
Mrs Causey has taken the chance to visit her mother Marion, who now lives in Margam, Port Talbot.
Her father Ken Hearse, formerly the head teacher of Cornelly School, died some years ago.
The story began in July 1968, a year before man first stepped on the moon, when young Sandra Morris was sailing back to her home in Pennsylvania, USA, with her parents after a holiday to Europe.
On the deck one evening, she wrote a note on a postcard, sealed it in a wine bottle then tossed it hopefully into the heaving Atlantic waves.
Almost immediately lost in the rising and falling mass of water the neatly written note inside began: “Whoever finds this bottle please write to me at. . .”
Three months later, in October 1968, another eight-year-old girl was walking along a Welsh beach.
Rosalind Hearse, of Cornelly, on the border between Bridgend and Port Talbot, was holding the hand of her head teacher father Ken, as they walked along Morfa Beach at Margam, Port Talbot, in front of the town’s steel plant.
Rosalind spotted the bottle gleaming in the weak October sunshine and dashed to pick it up from the sand.
Now Rosalind Causey, a former nurse turned IT consultant and mother-of-two living in Suffolk, she recalled: “I took the cork from the wine bottle, replied to Sandra’s little note, and we have been in touch ever since.
“Although in these modern times we have now moved on from sea-mail to e-mail, the majority of our correspondence in the past has been via air mail.
“I used to love seeing the post man bring us a letter with a US Air Mail stamp.
“Our friendship grew through our letters as we shared amazingly parallel lives. We each have two children, a boy and girl, and our eldest were born just 10 days apart.”
Rosalind and Sandra (now Sandra Morris-Czapla) first met face-to-face in 1976, when Rosalind flew to USA for the first time to celebrate the American bicentenary.
Then in 2000, Rosalind’s two children Rhiannon, 17, and Ivan, 14, and Sandra’s two children Ahna, 15, and Austen, 17. all met for the first time.
Mrs Causey said:“The meeting came about after my two children amazingly won a trip to Disney World in a children’s design-a-Millennium flag competition.
“As soon as she heard we were visiting the USA, Sandra arranged to join us – we were lucky enough to get adjoining rooms in a hotel – and the children became firm friends.”
In April of this year Mrs Causey and her husband Mark, a chartered engineer, met up once more with Sandra and her husband Doug, who works at a golf course, in New York.
Mrs Causey said: “We persuaded Sandra to visit us (last time she was in UK was in 1977 for the Queen’s Silver Jubilee) and we have been delighted to be able to visit the spot where I found the Sandra’s message in a bottle all those years ago.”
The Causeys and the Morris-Czaplas went to Morfa Beach yesterday.
Mrs Causey said: “It was a lovely way to celebrate the 40th anniversary of a very unusual friendship.”
She added: “You often hear stories of messages in a bottle floating thousands of miles but how often do you hear of people actually meeting up a making a connection as a result?”
Mrs Causey has taken the chance to visit her mother Marion, who now lives in Margam, Port Talbot.
Her father Ken Hearse, formerly the head teacher of Cornelly School, died some years ago.
Help moving forward.
Hurricane Sandy devastated the East Coast of the United States in late 2012, but amazingly, it managed to jar loose one particular piece of debris that would change the life of a woman named Mimi Fery. A worker cleaning up an area of Long Island found a green ginger ale bottle with a note inside, which he showed to his supervisor. After reading the note, his supervisor decided to call the number written on the message, which led him to Fery. Mimi had lost her 18-year-old daughter, Sidonie, in a tragic accident in 2010, but soon realized the note inside the bottle had been penned by her daughter a decade before its discovery.
Receiving the note almost two years after her daughter’s death provided closure and comfort to Mimi, offering a simple yet profound message that enabled her to move forward with her life. So what did the note say? It was a quote from Sidonie’s favorite childhood movie, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, telling its finder to “Be excellent to yourself, dude.”
Receiving the note almost two years after her daughter’s death provided closure and comfort to Mimi, offering a simple yet profound message that enabled her to move forward with her life. So what did the note say? It was a quote from Sidonie’s favorite childhood movie, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, telling its finder to “Be excellent to yourself, dude.”
Returned after 76 years.
A message in a bottle that was cast out to sea 76 years ago has been found in New Zealand and returned to the family of the person who originally wrote it. The bottle was discovered by Geoff Flood in November of 2012, with a note inside which said, "At sea. Would the finder of this bottle kindly forward this note, where found, date, to under mentioned address."
The paper was signed March 17 and it is believed it was released in 1936 by Herbert Ernest Hillbrick, who put his address and name on the note. Mr. Flood found the bottle on New Zealand's Ninety Mile Beach. It is believed that Mr. Hillbrick was on a P&O cruise when he dropped the bottle into the sea.
Mr. Flood discovered that the author of the message had died in the 1940s but his grandson, Peter Hillbrick, was living in Australia. "This one was floating around in the ocean for 76 years and just all of a sudden popped up in New Zealand," Mr. Hillbrick said
The paper was signed March 17 and it is believed it was released in 1936 by Herbert Ernest Hillbrick, who put his address and name on the note. Mr. Flood found the bottle on New Zealand's Ninety Mile Beach. It is believed that Mr. Hillbrick was on a P&O cruise when he dropped the bottle into the sea.
Mr. Flood discovered that the author of the message had died in the 1940s but his grandson, Peter Hillbrick, was living in Australia. "This one was floating around in the ocean for 76 years and just all of a sudden popped up in New Zealand," Mr. Hillbrick said
Captured crew saved from pirates.
In 2011, a crew from a hijacked cargo boat was saved by British commandos after sending their rescuers a message in a bottle. The captured seamen, trapped in a sealed and armored part of their vessel as it was over-run by pirates, threw their note into the water when two NATO ships arrived to free them.
Their message, explaining that they were safe and well, was retrieved from the ocean by special forces before they stormed the ship. The crew members were all rescued unhurt, save for one with a cut hand, and the pirates were arrested.
Their message, explaining that they were safe and well, was retrieved from the ocean by special forces before they stormed the ship. The crew members were all rescued unhurt, save for one with a cut hand, and the pirates were arrested.
30 years later… via Facebook.
Oliver Vandevalle, who sent a message in a bottle over 30 years ago, finally received a reply after a Facebook user tracked down the Belgian on the popular social networking site.
During a family sailing holiday along the south coast of England at the age of 14, Vandevalle cast a page of his notebook adrift in a wine bottle. 33 years later the Belgian received his reply after Lorraine Yates found the bottle washed ashore at Swanage in Dorset. Rather than reply by using the enclosed address, Yates tracked Vandevalle down using the popular social networking site Facebook.
Vandevalle, 47, said, "It was so, so long ago that my first reaction when she contacted me was to say, 'It wasn't me.' Then I remembered.” The letter introduced Vandevalle as "a boy of 14 years and my house is in Belgium." He continued by saying, "I do not know if you are a pupil, a woman or a man. I am on a sailing boat of 18 metres. Her name is Tamaris. While I am writing this letter we have just passed Portland Bill on the south coast of England. We left this morning."
Vandevalle's two sons have attempted to recreate their father's amazing feat, though he doubts they will succeed. "They were stupid enough not to write their address and, consequently the chances of getting a reply are almost nil," their father added.
NOTE: Lorraine Yates claimed she found the letter only a couple of weeks after it was sent but she put it away and completely forgot all about it. Out of curiosity, as an adult having found the letter amongst her paperwork, she decided to contact Oliver to offer him a copy of the letter.
During a family sailing holiday along the south coast of England at the age of 14, Vandevalle cast a page of his notebook adrift in a wine bottle. 33 years later the Belgian received his reply after Lorraine Yates found the bottle washed ashore at Swanage in Dorset. Rather than reply by using the enclosed address, Yates tracked Vandevalle down using the popular social networking site Facebook.
Vandevalle, 47, said, "It was so, so long ago that my first reaction when she contacted me was to say, 'It wasn't me.' Then I remembered.” The letter introduced Vandevalle as "a boy of 14 years and my house is in Belgium." He continued by saying, "I do not know if you are a pupil, a woman or a man. I am on a sailing boat of 18 metres. Her name is Tamaris. While I am writing this letter we have just passed Portland Bill on the south coast of England. We left this morning."
Vandevalle's two sons have attempted to recreate their father's amazing feat, though he doubts they will succeed. "They were stupid enough not to write their address and, consequently the chances of getting a reply are almost nil," their father added.
NOTE: Lorraine Yates claimed she found the letter only a couple of weeks after it was sent but she put it away and completely forgot all about it. Out of curiosity, as an adult having found the letter amongst her paperwork, she decided to contact Oliver to offer him a copy of the letter.
24 years in a beer bottle.
Nearly a quarter-century after a German boy tossed a message in a bottle off a ship in the Baltic Sea, he's received an answer. A 13-year-old Russian, Daniil Korotkikh, was walking with his parents on a beach when he saw something glittering in the sand. “I saw that bottle and it looked interesting,” Korotkikh said. “It looked like a German beer bottle with a ceramic plug, and there was a message inside.” His father, who knows German, translated the letter, which was carefully wrapped in cellophane and sealed with a medical bandage. It said, “My name is Frank, and I'm five years old. My dad and I are traveling on a ship to Denmark. If you find this letter, please write back to me, and I will write back to you.” The letter, dated 1987, included an address in the town of Coesfeld.
The boy in the letter, Frank Uesbeck, is now 29. His parents still live at the letter's address. The Russian boy and the German man met each other earlier this month via an Internet video link. Korotkikh showed Uesbeck the bottle where he found the message and the framed letter.
The boy in the letter, Frank Uesbeck, is now 29. His parents still live at the letter's address. The Russian boy and the German man met each other earlier this month via an Internet video link. Korotkikh showed Uesbeck the bottle where he found the message and the framed letter.
3,000 miles to Spain.
A Maine teenager and her sister put messages into bottles and tossed them out to sea while visiting their aunt on Monhegan Island three years ago.
Last week, she received a handwritten letter from a fisherman saying that her message had been found more than 3,000 miles away.
“I think it’s really cool,” Terra Gallo, now 14, told WCSH-TV. “At first, we were really surprised, wow, all the way to Spain, and when we looked at ocean current then it made sense that it went that way.”
Gallo said she and her sister Nola had forgotten all about the messages as the years went by. She studied maps of ocean currents and believes the bottle traveled from the Gulf Stream to the North Atlantic Drift and the Canary Current.
In his letter, the fisherman wrote: “I hope you are as thrilled to receive this letter as I was when I found your bottle and I hope we'll receive more answers when I return the bottle to the sea.”
Her mother Susan Gallo, said it was really meaningful to get a handwritten letter from the fisherman in a time of so much electronics and hopes that inspires her family to write more letters.
Gallo's message asked that whoever found her bottle put their own message inside with hers and send it back out to sea. The fisherman said he complied with her wishes in his letter.
Last week, she received a handwritten letter from a fisherman saying that her message had been found more than 3,000 miles away.
“I think it’s really cool,” Terra Gallo, now 14, told WCSH-TV. “At first, we were really surprised, wow, all the way to Spain, and when we looked at ocean current then it made sense that it went that way.”
Gallo said she and her sister Nola had forgotten all about the messages as the years went by. She studied maps of ocean currents and believes the bottle traveled from the Gulf Stream to the North Atlantic Drift and the Canary Current.
In his letter, the fisherman wrote: “I hope you are as thrilled to receive this letter as I was when I found your bottle and I hope we'll receive more answers when I return the bottle to the sea.”
Her mother Susan Gallo, said it was really meaningful to get a handwritten letter from the fisherman in a time of so much electronics and hopes that inspires her family to write more letters.
Gallo's message asked that whoever found her bottle put their own message inside with hers and send it back out to sea. The fisherman said he complied with her wishes in his letter.