There’s a 75-year-old story about a message in a bottle that may have yielded the finder as much as $6 million. Just weeks ago, that urban legend found its way to Lebanon after a thrift shopper purchased an old glass bottle for 99 cents.
“I thought, ‘Little ol’ Lebanon? Really?’ Coming and finding something like this; I thought it’s so fun,” said Karen Singleton, who found a message in the bottle.
Singleton was at Super Thrift when she saw a beautiful green glass bottle tucked behind some items on a shelf that kept catching her eye.
“I go thrifting a lot,” she said. “I went in there one day and I kept walking past and I kept seeing this jar. I could tell something was in it, but I didn’t pick it up at first.”
She finally reached for the corked bottle and, upon picking it up, noticed papers shifting inside. Her immediate reaction was “Ooooh!”
Singleton then joked to herself, “Curiosity killed the cat… but I’m a dog lover.”
Ninety-nine cents seemed like a fair price to pay to discover what was inside and, at the least, she would have a beautiful bottle to look at. Even an employee and people next to her in line found the bottle curious and speculated whether it could be a will or love letter inside.
After paying for her treasures, Singleton went straight home so she could figure out how to get the message in the bottle out of its glass walls.
“It was just a tiny little cork, but there was no way to get it out,” she said. “As soon as I pulled it out, it just disintegrated.”
On the bottom of the bottle are the words “Duraglas” along with a diamond symbol surrounding the letter I. After a little research, Singleton believes the bottle might have once held, perhaps, beer out of Germany. More inquiry reveals the bottle might be from the early- to mid-century.
Setting aside the little cork pieces, Singleton then worked on pulling out the rolled up pieces of paper and unraveling them.
Her first thought was, “Oh, it’s on kid paper.”
Newspapers in 1949 reported the story of 55-year-old Jack J. Wurm, a maitre d’hotel (restaurant worker) who literally stumbled on a brown whiskey bottle on a beach in San Francisco and found within it what appeared to be a handwritten will.
It read, “To avoid all confusion I leave my entire estate to the lucky person who finds this bottle and to my attorney, Barry Cohen, share and share alike. Daisy Alexander – June 20, 1937.”
Given that it was written on a scrap of rough brown wrapping paper, Wurm decided it was probably a college kid’s prank. Some months later, however, a friend told him there might be legitimacy to the will. That’s because Daisy Alexander – who had no children of her own – was an heiress to the Singer Sewing Machine family and was worth $12 million at her death in 1939.
It was reported that Alexander was an eccentric woman who had “a curious interest in floating communications around in a bottle,” according to her lawyer, Barry Cohen. He also reported he had written multiple wills for her over the years, but not a single copy could be found after she died.
Some 75 years later, a thrift shopper in Lebanon unraveled a piece of paper and read the words contained thereon.
“I get the papers out and literally my face – I was like a kid in a candy store. I really was,” she said.
It read, “To the lucky person who finds this bottle I leave my entire estate to be divided equally with my lawyer Barry Cohen. Daisy Singer Alexander February 1st 1937 London, England.”
Singleton said she is coming out of a “rough few years” after battling cancer and becoming medically retired.
Last year she began leaving miniature Jesus figurines around town for fun and inspiration, and as conversation pieces.
Having found this message in a bottle, she questioned whether this was God’s way of answering her prayers. Then she unraveled three smaller pieces of paper that were also in the bottle.
On them were written messages “from God,” declaring he delights in the finder and the finder has eternal life through Jesus. The words made her cry.
“I was like, ‘OK, this is a sign.’ I walked past this bottle three times and now you’re (God) answering these prayers in the most oddest way,” she said. “But at the same point I’m like, this is pretty cool for the little town of Lebanon. Even if it’s a bunch of kids doing it, it’s fun.”
Singleton used to work for an attorney who does wills, so she said she might settle the question by reaching out to her.
“I’m half tempted to actually ask her to do some background searching for me, to see if she can find anything, because you never know. You hear about things like this. I mean, I’d have a heart attack if somebody said, ‘Yeah, you’re $12 million richer,’” she said with a laugh.
It appears Wurm never received his half of Alexander’s estate, and that, in fact, her niece and nephew ended up with the money on a probate.
“Obviously it’s a fluke,” Singleton said about her message in a bottle, “but could you imagine if it was real and you’re sittin’ on $12 million?”