Message in a Bottle found During a Beach Sweep
You never know what you will find when you are doing a beach sweep on Nanny Goat beach. On October 14, David Humphries found something special.
Once a month, on low tide, Friends of Sapelo members hop on the 9:00 ferry and travel to Sapelo Island for the purpose of picking up trash that has washed ashore on Nanny Goat Beach on the south end of Sapelo Island. October was the first sweep after Hurricane Irma came to visit on September 11, 2017. The storm brought in a lot of trash but on the way out, the storm took away the sand dunes.
As is typical with a beach sweep, members drag their find back to the car park area to sort out items that can be recycled. David was sifting through the trash when he discovered a plastic bottle that appeared to have something in it. He unscrewed the top and pulled out a folded piece of paper. It turned out to be a note from a young girl.
In 1988, a little girl was visiting Edisto Beach, SC for the weekend with her family. She decided to put a note in a bottle with hope that it would be found and returned by a stranger far away.. The note said, "Hello, my name is Miranda Dawn Moss. I am 8 years old. I am in third grade at Foster Park Union, SC. My home address is .........."
So David decided to honor Miranda's request and return the note written 29 years ago. Attempts to locate Miranda by conventional methods, looking up her home address, contacting her school, and reaching out to local news outlets were not successful. So he turned the task over to his wife, Linda. She put the story on Facebook, and the power of social media took over. Since that post, the story has gone viral around the country and internationally. And yes, it also found Miranda Dawn Moss Chavez.
When Linda contacted her, Miranda said that she remembered putting the note in the bottle and throwing it into the ocean on September 26, but after her family left the beach she forgot about it. The letter has been returned and with it Linda extended an invitation for Miranda and her family to visit and join us on a Friends of Sapelo Beach Sweep. You never know what you might find!
