Secret Beer Bottle Message Buried In Montclair 112 Years Ago

MONTCLAIR, NJ — In July 1907, two bricklayers from Newark put a message inside a beer bottle and sealed it inside a wall at the then-under-construction Montclair State University.

The message read:

“This is to certify that this wall was built by two bricklayers from Newark, N.J., by the names of William Hanly and James Lennon, members of No. 3 of the B.M.I.U. of America.”

The message – located in a wall at MSU College Hall – would take 112 years to be discovered.

According to school administrators, the bottle recently resurfaced as workers were carrying out a renovation of College Hall. Robert Kanaby, a demolition laborer, said he made the intriguing discovery when he hit a void in the wall.

“I heard glass break,” he told MSU administrators. “And I’m like, ‘Something’s not right.’”

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