Chad Pregracke finds all kinds of things while cleaning America's waterways, but is most excited when he finds messages in bottles, reports Lauren Ashburn in USA Today (11/5/09). Chad runs a not-for-profit called Living Lands & Waters, which "has trawled hundreds of miles of rivers from the Mississippi to the Potomac, picking up trash and piling it onto four barges he operates." He's found more than 12,322 balls, 587 milk crates, 775 refrigerators and 55,301 tires, among other things. But what he treasures most are the 70 messages in bottles he's found.

The bottled messages he and his crew have collected are sometimes poignant, such as one from a mother to her dead child. Sometimes the bottles contain fake treasure maps. One read: "I'm a blonde-haired, blue-eyed river girl looking for Mr. Right..." Unfortunately, the phone number was illegible. Another read: "I'm 8 years old and I live on a farm in Nebraska ..." Chad's favorite message is one he found "five or six years ago on the Ohio River, near Paducah, Ky," which contained a song, called "Lavender for You," written for guitar.

Chad had someone play it for him and muses, "Someday I'll retire on this music. It will be my hit song." Sometimes the messages are from people who simply want to know if their message is found. Says Chad: "I called one guy who was a truck driver and said, 'I think you threw this off a bridge in Burlington.' He was so pumped to hear from me." Usually, the phone numbers are no longer working, though. Chad saves all the bottled messages he finds, explaining, "It's somebody's story. It must have meant a lot for them to write it and send it out there. To throw it away wouldn't be right."