TAMPA, Florida — It is not uncommon to find waste and debris from storm surge hurricanes and tropical storms, but a Tampa Bay woman made a historic discovery after Hurricane Debby Blown Through: A Message in a Bottle from the World War II Era.
Suzanne Flament-Smith told CBS News affiliate WTSP that she was walking down Bayshore Boulevard when she saw the amount of trash left after the storm in Safety Harbor, a town on Oregon’s west coast. Tampa Bay.
“There was so much plastic. I was like, ‘Okay, this is driving me crazy,’” she said. “I usually keep a trash bag and gloves in my car.”
Flament-Smith decided to take the initiative and start cleaning up the waste. That’s when she came across the bottle.
“As I was filling my third bag, I noticed a glass bottle that had the writing on it, the note and the writing,” Flament-Smith said. “I thought, ‘Oh my God, I think I just found a message in a bottle.’”
Knowing it was no ordinary litter box, she kept it safe and brought it home to open with her family.
Inside the bottle, Flament-Smith found all sorts of contents: a few cartridges, a bullet casing, a “mini cannonball” and some sand; but the biggest surprise was the note inside, she told WTSP.
In the photos shared on Facebook, the note is seen written in cursive ink on an old piece of paper with most of the words erased.
“Dear Lee, I received your letter yesterday, [and] “I was glad to hear from you,” Flament-Smith read to WTSP.
What she could make out appeared to be a message between friends named Lee and Chris.
“I’m going back to school, to radio school,” the letter continues.
What was remarkable was the date: “3/4/45” was etched next to a piece of U.S. Navy letterhead from the Little Creek Amphibious Training Base in Virginia.
“It seemed like he was a Navy serviceman for a friend because he was mentioning that he wanted to see him soon and things like that,” Flament-Smith said.
More than 800 miles from Safety Harbor, that same naval base still exists, but under a different name: Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story.
“We were created because with World War II, they needed a place to train amphibious forces like the ones that landed on D-Day in Normandy 80 years ago,” Navy public affairs officer April Phillips told WTSP.
When WTSP shared Flament-Smith’s story with the Navy, Phillips said they were reviewing the letter to determine its authenticity and authorship.
“We will [do] “We’re going to do some digging and see what we can find and I’m looking forward to that trip to find out what we’re going to learn,” Phillips said, adding that the letter could be a first-person account dating back to when the base opened in the 1940s.
Flament-Smith’s good cleanup may have unearthed a unique piece of history, WTSP reported, and she hopes it can be shared with those close to its mystery.
“I try to tell my kids that if they do good, good things will happen,” she said. “There’s a sense of excitement, and also like a story — a story that hopefully will find its place.”
