Bottled Messages May Bring Fortunes
ALIVE|November 2016

Some times, they can be instrumental in unleashing your bottled up fate.

T. Rajagopalan
Bottled Messages May Bring Fortunes

A bedraggled starving man wholly broken through the loss of his life’s savings, Jack Wurm by name, stood on seashore in San Fransisco in March 1949 to jump into the sea and take his life out. When he was about to take a plunge into the waters he found, to his astonishment, a bottle in the waves that crashed near him.

Impelled by curiosity, he picked up the bottle and browsed the contents of an epistle he found therein. “To avoid confusion, I leave my entire estate, to the lucky person who finds this bottle and to my attorney Barry Comen. Signed Daisy Alexander, June 10, 1937.”

The finder of the bottle came to know that Daisy Alexander aka Daisa Singer was none other than an eccentric heiress to some $1,2,000,000 of the Singer Sewing Machine fortune. In 1938, Daisy who was then in the twilight of her life had expired of stroke and no final will could be found.

After Jack Wurm in California cracked the missing case of this will, Daisy’s close associates recollected that one of her eccentricities was to toss bottles into the river or sea and contemplate where would they sail and ultimately reach.

As an ocean-current expert explained that a bottle dropped into the Thames River in London could wash to the English Channel, then to the North Sea, through the Berring Straits into the North Pacific and end up in California or Mexico.

According to him, this would take approximately a dozen years. It took 11-and-a-half years actually. It took another seven years for the case to travel through various courts before Wurm was paid the fabulous sum.

Similarly a young boy, who worked in a farm, found a sealed bottle on the sands of a beach which contained a note that the finder would win an award of 10,000 dollars if the note was forwarded to an address in New York.

This story is from the November 2016 edition of ALIVE.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.

This story is from the November 2016 edition of ALIVE.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.

MORE STORIES FROM ALIVEView All
The Deadly Roads
ALIVE

The Deadly Roads

Between 2000 and 2015, governments have registered 1,649,770 accidents and 1,039,372 fatalities. And over 50 lakh persons were injured, many handicapped and traumatised for life.

time-read
6 mins  |
October 2016
How Well Does Facebook
ALIVE

How Well Does Facebook

This social site interface judges your personality traits using data fed by you.

time-read
3 mins  |
October 2016
Murder At Midnight
ALIVE

Murder At Midnight

Some events are beyond the limits of earthly explanations.

time-read
4 mins  |
October 2016
Are Builders Following Suit Of Mallya
ALIVE

Are Builders Following Suit Of Mallya

It is a tough challenge for the Modi Government to round up the big defaulters and compel them to cough up the dues they owe to the country.

time-read
9 mins  |
April 2017
UP Shocker
ALIVE

UP Shocker

Smajawadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party may take some time to come out of this shock.

time-read
9 mins  |
April 2017
Is Gujarat On The Way To Fascism?
ALIVE

Is Gujarat On The Way To Fascism?

People are forced to change their food habits out of fear of life imprisonment for killing or eating a cow.

time-read
6 mins  |
June 2017
Battle Over Cattle
ALIVE

Battle Over Cattle

With the matter all set to go to court, the Centre finds itself on a precarious footing.

time-read
3 mins  |
June 2017
Cows Get Legal Protection
ALIVE

Cows Get Legal Protection

Butchers now cannot procure cows from cattle fairs or mandis for slaughtering.

time-read
5 mins  |
June 2017
Oil Pollution In Seas An Untold Disaster
ALIVE

Oil Pollution In Seas An Untold Disaster

Countries around the world are awakening to this new problem that is endangering the marine life.

time-read
4 mins  |
June 2017
China Woes Vietnam: Concern For India
ALIVE

China Woes Vietnam: Concern For India

The Dragon is wooing the tiny Southeast Asian nation to wean it away from India.

time-read
7 mins  |
March 2017