Message in a Bottle: Fisherman’s Catch Nets Hope on Father’s Day

What Nick Anderson caught in the Detroit River a year ago on Father’s Day could mean six kids who lost their father in a senseless act of violence several years ago will get a college education.

Anderson was fishing when he saw a bottle floating in the murky river. When he lowered his net and scooped it up, he discovered heart-wrenching notes written by children who were obviously missing their dad, WXYZ, Channel 7 reports.

What was written jerked at his heart:

“Happy Father’s Day,” one read, written in the scrawl of a not-yet-mature grammar school hand.

“I love you and care about you.”

“I know that one day we will see you in a better place …”

And on they went, filling Anderson with emotion – “I’m like jelly,” he told the television station – but also a with sense of purpose and resolve.

“These were such passionate, sorrowful letters,” he said. He knew he had “something to do here.”

For nearly a year, he had little luck finding the children who had written the haunting messages. But the missing pieces of the heartbreaking puzzle began to fall into place when he shared the story with Pastor Barry Randolph of Detroit’s Church of the Messiah as the two were putting together a real-estate deal.

Randolph read the letters. “Immediately, my heart melted,” he told WXYZ. “I said, ‘I want to do something for these young people.”

With the help of the WXYZ news team and Wayne County Clerk Cathy Garrett, the family of Michael Travis, who died four years ago, was located.

Renee Travis said visits to the cemetery left them feeling empty and drained, and she suggested last year that it would be cathartic for them to write letters. They did, rolled them up in an orange juice bottle and tossed them in the Detroit River.

"I told the kids he will see the letters, he is in Heaven, they will get to him," Renee Travis said.

Randolph, the pastor, believes Michael Travis is an angel who knew the bottle would be found and somehow forge a better life for his family.

Michael and Renee had talked about how they could help their kids realize their professional dreams, and in the years since his death, her grief has been coupled with worries about how she’ll send them to college.

Anderson’s catch in the Detroit River may have solved that.

Randolph said his church plans to set up a college fund for the six children.