MENDOCINO, Calif. With the help of his mom, a 5-year-old California boy has taken to social media to find the mystery author of a decades-old message he found in a bottle on New Years Eve.
Ryder Goggin was walking along the beach last week when he noticed something behind a log, according to ABC News. He yelled for his mom to join him thrilled that hed found an actual treasure in the sand.
The discovery turned out to be a message rolled up inside a glass bottle, with the cap rusted shut.
I didnt believe him at first, Ryders mother, Heather Baird, told ABC. He was really excited; he was yelling about it.
Baird had to work pretty hard to get it open, but when she finally did, she was amazed to see the paper inside was nearly perfectly preserved in plastic wrap. Ryder was a little less pleased.
When we opened it, he seemed a little disappointed because he wanted it to be a treasure map, she said.
But the contents of the note sparked a different kind of hunt not for treasure, exactly, but for the person who wrote it nearly 30 years ago.
Hi, my name is Chris, the letter reads. I am 10 years old and in the fifth grade. I live in Sacramento. Call me when you find this to let me know where it washed ashore.
The letter was dated Sept. 5, 1988.
Baird tried calling the number only to find it had been disconnected. So she took a picture of the letter and posted it to Facebook and Twitter with the hopes someone would see it and lead her to Chris.
To her surprise, thousands of people joined the search. The post has been shared more than 4,000 times, sparked a #findChris hashtag and inspired dozens of media stories. New York Seltzer, the company that manufactured the bottle in which the message was found, offered a free years supply of the drink to the person who tracks down Chris, Baird said.
While they havent found him yet, Baird said shed like to think the 10-year-old Chris who wrote the message was a lot like Ryder.
Chris had an adventurous spirit and he put the bottle on the water, and Ryder was the perfect little boy to find it, she said. I hope we find Chris I would just thank him for putting the bottle on the water and allowing us this amazing experience.
Ryder Goggin was walking along the beach last week when he noticed something behind a log, according to ABC News. He yelled for his mom to join him thrilled that hed found an actual treasure in the sand.
The discovery turned out to be a message rolled up inside a glass bottle, with the cap rusted shut.
I didnt believe him at first, Ryders mother, Heather Baird, told ABC. He was really excited; he was yelling about it.
Baird had to work pretty hard to get it open, but when she finally did, she was amazed to see the paper inside was nearly perfectly preserved in plastic wrap. Ryder was a little less pleased.
When we opened it, he seemed a little disappointed because he wanted it to be a treasure map, she said.
But the contents of the note sparked a different kind of hunt not for treasure, exactly, but for the person who wrote it nearly 30 years ago.
Hi, my name is Chris, the letter reads. I am 10 years old and in the fifth grade. I live in Sacramento. Call me when you find this to let me know where it washed ashore.
The letter was dated Sept. 5, 1988.
Baird tried calling the number only to find it had been disconnected. So she took a picture of the letter and posted it to Facebook and Twitter with the hopes someone would see it and lead her to Chris.
To her surprise, thousands of people joined the search. The post has been shared more than 4,000 times, sparked a #findChris hashtag and inspired dozens of media stories. New York Seltzer, the company that manufactured the bottle in which the message was found, offered a free years supply of the drink to the person who tracks down Chris, Baird said.
While they havent found him yet, Baird said shed like to think the 10-year-old Chris who wrote the message was a lot like Ryder.
Chris had an adventurous spirit and he put the bottle on the water, and Ryder was the perfect little boy to find it, she said. I hope we find Chris I would just thank him for putting the bottle on the water and allowing us this amazing experience.
