One of the first “OH MY!” moments while beachcombing happened when I was living in Nags Head and had just started my beachcombing journey.
I remember it being a full moon, and the shell pits were so massive. The shell pits stretched about two feet wide and four feet tall and seemed to roll like a ribbon all the way down the beach. When I would look ahead to the next area, it didn’t seem like there was much because the sand made a slight hill that blocked the view of the next shell pit. So, as I kept walking, the shell beds kept surprising me until I got to a flat section on the beach, and there was my gem!
At first, I thought it was a button. For seaglass collectors, finding a seaglass button ranks high on the list of trophy finds. Since I have a background in retail and have a passion for glass and vintage fashion, when I saw this “button” lying in the shell gravels, still wet from the last wave that was rolling back into the ocean, I thought to myself, this button is unusual, and yelled out, “OH MY!” I had never seen a button like this before!
The color of this “button” was also amazingly beautiful, especially for seaglass lovers, as it was a cornflower blue. But there was something about this “button” that I just couldn’t figure out. The shape was also a little off for buttons. It wasn’t flat, but rather was concave on one side. Since I found it early in my beachcombing era, I placed it in my “special” display bowl and went on about life.
Years later, I found a very similar “button” on Hatteras, but it was different. This one was the same cornflower blue and the same size, but it wasn’t as beautifully frosted, and it had a tiny wire in the middle that came out the concave side.
By that time, I had also developed quite a collection of lightbulbs that had been frosted by the sea. These lightbulbs were gathered in a basket on my porch, and one day, a cat of mine knocked them off, and several of them broke. But like all great mistakes, I made a discovery. As I cleaned up the shattered bulbs, I noticed one of them had my button on it.
As the bulbs end up in the ocean, maybe from a shipwreck or a house collapse or whatever the reason, the salt eats away at the metal end, known as the cap, which covers a part known as the insulator. Over time, the insulator becomes exposed to the ocean water elements and eventually is transformed into collectible seaglass.
Lightbulbs were introduced to the world by Thomas Edison in the 1870s, and vintage bulbs used all-glass insulators compared to modern bulbs that use plaster of Paris parts. Modern light bulbs won’t make these beautiful “button-like” seaglass treasures if they are ever in the ocean, unlike their vintage counterparts. So, my beautiful cornflower blue find wasn’t a button at all, but an insulator to a vintage lightbulb.
Over the years, I have also found several seaglass lightbulb insulators that are a deep purple color. Either way, they are stunning to behold.
In addition to lightbulbs, I have also found vacuum tubes, many of them which I believe came from some kind of radio. When holding a vacuum tube, it feels heavier than the lightbulbs, plus there are several prongs on the end instead of a screw cap.
I have several headlights from cars and a few small lightbulbs from appliances. Some are frosted all over and corroded on the ends, but completely intact. Some are missing the insulator cap, but I find it truly fascinating that they managed to make their way into my hands after finding their way into the ocean.
And that’s the magic of beachcombing: every walk is a mystery, and every find carries a story that spans tides, decades, and sometimes centuries. What began as a simple button became a window into a world of early innovation and forgotten relics, softened and sculpted by the sea.
About the Author: Kristin Hissong is a North Carolina native, a UNC Charlotte graduate, an Outer Banks resident of nearly 20 years, and a dedicated, “professional beachcomber.” She has spent more than 20,000 hours walking on both our local shores and shorelines around the Eastern Seaboard, and has collected thousands upon thousands of items from the Atlantic Ocean.
For the past decades or so, she has been beachcombing on Hatteras and Ocracoke Islands every day, collecting both treasures and trash on her routine expeditions. From typewriters to coffee makers, fishing rods to recliners, if you name it, there’s a good chance she has seen it washed up, and has hauled it back to her collection, or to the closest dumpster.
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