100-Year-Old Message in a Bottle Washes Up on Beach in German Town

What could be the oldest message in a bottle ever found has washed up on the shores of Germany.

The message, released sometime between 1904 and 1906, was found in April in the German town Amrum, the CBC reports. The couple who found the bottle discovered a postcard requesting that the messaged be sent to the Marine Biological Association of the U.K.

“We were very excited,” Guy Baker, a spokesman for the biological association, told the network. “We certainly weren’t expecting to receive any more of the postcards.”

The bottle is reportedly one of about 1,000 that British researcher George Parker Bidder released into the North Sea before becoming the organization’s president. The bottles were used to study the movement of sea currents.

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Each bottle carries a postcard that assures the finder a “one shilling reward” if it was returned to the association with information on where and when the bottle was found.

The marine association is considering having the the Guinness Book of Records acknowledge message at the oldest that’s ever been found, taking the title from a message that was discovered 99 years after its release.