Dans Papers - June 1, 2007 - The Beach Glass Mystery

As a child I spent many a lazy Saturday afternoon combing the seashore for treasures. I found numerous shells of all shapes and sizes, pieces of driftwood and from time to time a precious piece of beach glass. This was the ultimate treasure because the colors were always so beautifully frosted and there was always a bit of mystery about where it came from. Throughout the years I have collected many pieces of colored glass from the seashore and kept them in a glass jar. I continue to stop and pick up glass on the beach when I have the time. Most of these glass pieces lately are green, white, and brown. Occasionally I find a blue piece or even red. This is of course a "banner day" at the beach.

The other day while taking one of my walks along the sea, I came upon a tiny piece of orange beach glass. I started thinking about sea glass. What is the story about beach glass? The sea manages to turn unwanted pieces of broken glass into beautifully rounded frosted jewels. What is this glass in the first place, how is it formed, and where does it really come from? These questions rolling around my head made me think that it was all worth checking out. Here are a few interesting things that I discovered.

Sea glass, beach glass, mermaid tears, or lucky glass; It goes by many names, but is made the very same way. Whether it began as a discarded bottle or an amazing glass relic from long ago, sea glass begins as regular glass. Sooner or later it gets tossed into the sea, tumbled by the ocean waves, and transformed by the sand, surf and salt water into the treasure which is washed up along the shore

Maybe it was someone's discarded coke bottle, or perhaps it came from an old shipwreck. It's interesting to think about where these bits of glass came from in the first place. Where on earth did it start its journey?

The fact is that wherever you find people living near the sea, you will find beach glass and sometimes the story that it brings with it. Scientists say that it takes a minimum of three years for the ocean to wear glass down to the point where it can officially be called beach glass. There are different kinds as well. "Rounds" are what remain from the bottom of old bottles. Some people collect these rounds and make wind chimes out them. Other pieces of beach glass are still imprinted with brand names and unique patterns and some glass is campfire glass which is basically glass that has been melted in a fire and smooth down by the ocean. The most common beach glass is simply rounded out shards of something we can't quite recognize anymore. It's fun to speculate about what they use to be. These small shards of tumbled glass are the ones often used for jewelry or in making colorful glass mosaics.

I often wonder why I don't find the quantity of beach glass as I used to when I was a kid. This is probably because glass is no longer used as it was in the past. Before the 1960s, everything came in glass bottles and jars, even milk. Today plastic has replaced most of the glass we use every day. People also used to throw a great deal of their household trash into the ocean, thinking that it would simply just disappear. We know better today. People are aware of pollution and are more informed about protecting our environment. Since recycling glass is such a popular idea, sea glass is becoming harder and harder to find. Beach glass is found along shorelines, even rivers and bays.

What about the color of the glass? Can that give us any clues?

The color of the glass always determines it's origin.

Red is the rarest of beach glass. Long ago red glass was made using a mixture of copper and gold. It was for that reason that many people could not afford the beautiful garnet reds in their collections. Today, you might be lucky enough to find a small piece of red glass. These bits of modern beach glass are often called "Riptide Rubies." Often the origin is a broken car brake light or boat light.

There are so many different colors. Depression glass is responsible for the light blues and pastel colors. Old medicine bottles and beer bottles are the brown and amber pieces. Clear glass may come from anything in recent years including shampoo bottles to milk bottles. However, clear glass that was produced before the year 1914 would have been made with manganese, with turns a purple color when exposed to ultraviolet rays. So, if you manage to find a little piece of purple glass, it could be very old glass which was once clear.

If you find a dark olive-green glass it could very well be what was known as "black glass" which was produced with amounts of iron and used for soda bottles before the 1900s when beverages needed to be protected form the light or they would spoil.

As you can see, each piece of colored glass tells a story. It represents a time in history whether just five years ago or twenty-five years ago.

Everyone has their favorite color of beach glass, as well as their favorite section of beach to comb. This time of year, before the crowds get here, is a great time to find beach treasures, especially glass. Look for places that get a lot of wave action and you should be in luck. I hope you will beg my pardon, but I am not going to divulge my own secret spot, or I may never find that purple piece for own collection.