Columbia, SC (WLTX) – 42 years after a 12-year-old boy threw a bottle in the Tyger River, his message inside was found.
"It's a once in a lifetime experience," Erik Richardson said.
Richardson said he was duck scouting at Lake Marion with a friend when something peculiar caught his eye.
"On the bank where we were camping we happened upon this bottle,” he said.
The green glass bottle was filled with BB gun pellets, gum wrappers and a note.
"Sure enough [I] found the note here," he said.
Dated April 10, 1976 and written in red ink the letter reads, "Dear Finder, I am in the 6th grade. I am twelve years old. I let this bottle go where the tiger rivers meet. I was fishing. I have 1 sister - 3 dogs and plenty of friends."
After posting on Facebook, Richardson connected with the sender, Mark Grant.
"One tough bottle," Grant said. "That had to be me because we went fishing there every Saturday, me and my dad. It didn't matter if it was rain, shine, cold. It didn't matter. We were out there."
After 42 years the message made its way from Spartanburg to Santee and it only asked one thing of Richardson.
"Send it on downstream. Write another note and send it on downstream,” Richardson said. “I probably will."
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