KETCHIKAN, Alaska — Twenty years ago, a honeymooning couple placed a handwritten message into a champagne bottle and set it adrift in the sea near Prince Rupert, B.C.
This past June, another couple, celebrating their first anniversary, found that bottle while beachcombing on a small island near Whale Passage.
“It was sitting there pretty as you please,” said Ashley Cooper, who first spotted the green bottle nestled between the branches of driftwood high on the shoreline of West Island. “As soon as I saw it, I knew what it was.”
Jake and Lori Fehr were married Aug. 17, 1991, in Manitoba, Canada.
The Fehrs spent their first honeymoon night on Manitoba’s Hecla Island, where they received a gift of champagne and a fruit basket. They took the champagne along to Prince Rupert.
“When we were at the ocean, we wrote a note and threw the bottle into the sea, wondering where it would end up and if we would ever hear from somebody finding it,” Lori Fehr said.
They soon returned to Manitoba, and time began to pass.
Every so often, they’d wonder what had happened to the bottle.
“We’ve talked about it on and off over the years,” Lori said.
They were reminded of it this past spring when one of their four children found a bottle with a year-old note in it at a pond near their home in Winkler, Manitoba.
“What are the chances that they would find a bottle with a note in it in the middle of the prairie is one thing — and then that someone would find ours, too?” she said.
In June, Ashley and Seth Cooper were visiting her parents at Whale Pass.
The Coopers have been married for one year, and were out in the Kashevarof Islands area beachcombing for the glass floats that once were used by the fishing fleets of Japan and others.
“Some of (the glass floats) have been floating out in the ocean for years and years and years, and they wash up on these beaches,” Seth Cooper said.
As they were walking the tideline of West Island, Ashley saw glass.
“All of sudden, my wife said, ‘I’ve found a bottle,'” Seth Cooper said.
Ashley picked it up right a away.
“It was sitting there up top like it was waiting for me,” she said.
“It was obviously a note in a bottle,” Seth said. “You could see it as plain as day, inside the bottle, and you could even read some of it.”
Removing the bottle’s cork, they found the paper inside to be damp and fragile. The bottle was broken to retrieve the message intact.
The message was dated Aug. 27, 1991; Ridley Island, B.C.
“To whom it may concern,” it read. “We have travelled from southern Manitoba to throw this bottle into the sea. Please write to us now that you have found it. We would appreciate it. Sincerely, Jake & Lori Fehr.”
Seth arranged the tattered paper on a driftwood log and photographed the message. He and Ashley wondered about the couple who had written the note two decades earlier.
Given the available clues, it was pretty clear what might have occurred.
“We kind of guessed at what it could have been,” Ashley said. “They were out on their honeymoon and they tossed the champagne bottle out into the ocean.”
The message included a Manitoba address.
A couple of days after the bottle was found, Seth Cooper located current contact information for the Fehrs on the Web.
Ashley called the number. One of the Fehrs’ three sons picked up.
“He came to me and said, ‘Someone called from Alaska, they found your bottle, and she’ll call back later,'” Lori Fehr said. “That was pretty exciting to hear that.”
Ashley did call back, and she enjoyed learning about the Fehrs and the circumstances of the note.
“They’re still together, happily married, with four children,” Ashely said.
Lori, too, enjoyed hearing about the couple who found the Fehrs’ message.
“God has blessed us these 20 years, and I hope that he’ll bless their family as well,” Lori said.
Seth Cooper said he’s still a bit surprised with the find.
“We were looking for these collectible things and we found something that was way more uncommon,” he said.
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