A North Carolina husband and wife opened a mystery. When they uncorked a bottle, there was a decades-old message sealed inside the green glass.  It spent years buried beneath the sand, until a storm brought it to the curious couple.

On several day waves crashing at the Outer Banks create a beautiful scene.  However, the waves pounding Nags Head during a nor’easter on November 22nd created a mystery that continues to unfold.

"I couldn't wait to get home and get the message out cause I just knew it had a treasure map in it," said Ray Midgett who found the bottle.  Curiosity connects Ray and Sandy Midgett with a Navy sailor's message written more than 50 years ago.
 
"We had just walked up on the access and were looking around to see what happened, what kind of damage there was when we saw the bottle," said Sandy Midgett.

The Midgetts took the old tonic bottle home. But they could not reach the note without breaking the bottle.
 
"The message is dated June the 29th 1951. And it's written by an Earl G. Brenkman. He was aboard the USS Chipola, which we found out was a Navy tanker," said Ray Midgett.

The Midgetts believe Brenkman's words have been here in Nags Head for five decades. Until the nor’easter blew away the sand dunes.
 
"It had a metal cap on it and if a metal cap had been in the ocean for 50 years it would have been deteriorated altogether," Sandy Midgett said.

"What certainly did wash up here at the outer banks were a lot of questions about the young man who wrote that message."

"What was his mood? Was he happy? Was he a little sad he was leaving?" said Sandy Midgett.

"One genealogist has told us it's possible he died in 1984. They have found an Earl Brenkman.  If he did, then we hope maybe to find some of his relatives," Ray Midgett said.

Researchers from Norfolk to California are trying to help the Midgetts finally deliver Earl Brenkman's message in a bottle.