A Canadian mom was "shocked" recently when she learned a message in a bottle she wrote and threw into a lake over 20 years ago was discovered near where she launched it on the shore of Lake Saint Clair.
Makenzie Van Eyk, a mom of two children who attend St. John the Baptist Catholic Elementary School in Belle River, Ontario, told "Good Morning America" she received an unexpected phone call from the school on Oct. 25.
"I got a phone call from the school secretary and she said, 'Do you have a couple minutes?'" Van Eyk recalled. "Typically, when the school calls and asks that question, you're usually pretty frightened as a parent, but she said, 'It's good news. I just need you for a few moments. We found a letter that you wrote, and I think you're going to want to hear this.'"
It turned out that a current St. John the Baptist student named River had found a bottle near a pier on Lake Saint Clair with a rolled-up letter inside that was written by Van Eyk, then Makenzie Morris, a 9-year-old student in teacher Roland St. Pierre's fourth grade class.
In the letter, young Makenzie even requested that whoever found the letter contact the school to let them know.
"When I initially heard that the letter had been found, I was very shocked, something you don't expect to be found 26 years later," Van Eyk said. "For it to be found, especially by a child who goes to this school, was really exciting and memorable."
St. Pierre, now retired, said he heard about the uncanny development when he received an email from the current fourth grade teacher asking if Van Eyk had been one of his students.
"She says, 'Is this your student?' And when I saw it, [I was like,] 'Wow! Yes, it is! Wow,'" St. Pierre told "GMA." "It was wild, and it brought back memories."
Message in a bottle saves family stranded on waterfallSt. Pierre said he remembered giving the message-in-a-bottle assignment to his students back in 1998. The kids had typed up their letters on Commodore 64 computers in the school's first computer lab, and afterward, they only heard of one message in a bottle being found.
"We had done a study on the Great Lakes and the water unit, and I read to them the book 'Paddle to the Sea.' … From that, I gave them a writing assignment where they had to identify themselves and write up little things about what they learned," St. Pierre explained. "Then, we walked it over to the lake, and they all threw their bottles in the water. And a few weeks later, we received one response from Tecumseh, which is about 10 miles from here, but then, that was it, until two weeks ago."
Van Eyk's daughter Scarlet, who is currently a fourth grade student at St. John the Baptist, said her teacher shared her mom's letter with the class, leaving her completely surprised.
"My teacher read the note out to my class, and she didn't say the name, and then at the very end, she said the name, and I just couldn't believe it," Scarlet said.
For St. Pierre, who described the entire story as "unreal," it was just as remarkable to hear about the letter's discovery over two decades after he retired.
"The coincidences to this story -- the fact that Scarlet is in grade 4 at the same school that her mom [was] when she wrote it. The little boy who found the bottle, I taught his father as well. Like, what a coincidence," St. Pierre said. "It could have been anybody finding that bottle or never found. It's kind of odd, definitely."
Van Eyk said she hadn't remembered the contents of the letter, but seeing it and recalling the assignment was a nostalgic experience.
"I remembered sealing the bottles, the tops of the lids -- Mr. St. Pierre had us dip them in wax -- so that part was extremely memorable to me," Van Eyk said.
"I can see the power of education now and how it lives on. So it's definitely a beautiful moment," she added.
