Finding Treasure

Randy Barnhouse uses treasure hunting to forge human connection

Author Randy Barnhouse poses for a portrait at his home in Cape Girardeau. Tyler Graef - tgraef@semissourian.com

The idea of hunting and finding treasure sounds like an exciting adventure to most people, but few are willing to do the work to track it down. Those who do put in the time often come to realize the treasure they thought they were looking for actually looks much different once they find it. It’s less golden nuggets and emeralds, more cracked ceramic and rusty quarters. In fact, for every 100 bottle caps uncovered, you are likely to find only one tiny item of value. It’s definitely not a rich man’s game. Treasure hunting takes time, patience and a lot of back-breaking hard work, but for Randy Barnhouse of Cape Girardeau, who has a love of the hunt, it is worth it.

Growing up, Barnhouse didn’t have aspirations of becoming a treasure hunter, but through a series of events ended up in the right place at the right time. For him, that was Key West, Florida, in 1985. After fleeing Cape Girardeau’s harsh winters in search of a healthy dose of sunshine, he ended up landing a lifeguard gig and living on a houseboat. Soon after, he met Mel Fisher and found out about his efforts to discover the Nuestra Señora De Atocha, a sunken ship hidden on the ocean floor since September 6, 1622; a ship Fisher had been searching for, for 16 years. Enticed by the thrill, Barnhouse became a crew member, working alongside Fisher and learning the ropes of treasure hunting. Within a few months, they discovered the sunken ship and began recovering artifacts from the depths of the ocean floor. While they did find gold, silver and pieces of emeralds, it was the common everyday items that stuck with Barnhouse.

Author Randy Barnhouse displays an artifact he helped recover from the wreck Atocha. Tyler Graef - tgraef@semissourian.com

“We all like gold and silver and beautiful jewelry, but after I started recovering remarkable items, I gained an appreciation for who lost it and how it got there,” Barnhouse says.

And so his love of treasure hunting began.

Author Randy Barnhouse examines a map of the property where Samuel Clemens's boyhood home now sits, as well as a selection of artifacts recovered by Barnhouse at the site. Tyler Graef - tgraef@semissourian.com

Since that time, Barnhouse has moved back to Cape Girardeau, uncovering history in his own backyard. Through work on the Amy Elizabeth, a shipwreck discovered behind the Isle Casino in 2012, digging on the property of the Mark Twain boyhood home in Hannibal, Missouri, and local efforts to rescue bits of history from the dirt on the property of the Library Bar downtown, Barnhouse is now championing a different sort of treasure.

It’s a treasure he has highlighted in the book “Dear Samuel Clemens: Message in a Bottle,” which he wrote in 2017. The book is a series of letters addressed to the man behind the famous pen name Mark Twain. In them, Barnhouse notes not only solid historical data but also correlates the relationships between the items he’s found and the places he has found them. Though he never fancied himself a writer, Barnhouse has spent years researching the connections and commonalities between all four excavation sites.

“Sometimes a victory was writing a sentence or a paragraph, and some days, I’d spend several hours in the evenings pounding it out,” he says. “My interest was really piqued by the parallels.”

Parallels that kept making connections between events, people and moments in history. And while these connections are revealed through the pages of his book, they are also floating down the path of the mighty Mississippi River.

In true treasure hunter fashion, Barnhouse figured out a way to gift the world with a treasure hunt of their own. As each letter was written, he bottled it up, sealed it and tossed it into the Mississippi River; he has done this with 68 of them to date. And the journey isn’t easy. The bottle has to survive the roaring perils of the river, facing floods, droughts, boats, rocks and any number of troubles along the way.

“If you think it’s fun to throw a message in a bottle, imagine how much fun it would be to find one,” Barnhouse says.

So far, five bottles have been found. Within months of the first launch, Barnhouse received a phone call that bottle #1 was washed up, just a few hundred yards from where it was tossed. The most recent bottle survived all the way to Baton Rouge, Lousianna. It was bottle #60. Through interviews with the individuals who found his bottles, Barnhouse has found something more valuable than physical treasure: he’s found human connection. And it’s this connection that has helped him link parts of the past with parts of the present.

As far as the future goes, Barnhouse will continue to take daily walks on Main Street in Cape Girardeau and look for construction sites. He will pick up anything that catches his eye and investigate its whereabouts, and he will do the hard work of treasure hunting in hopes people will enjoy learning about his discoveries and recordings for years to come. He will continue to write letters to “Sam” and launch bottles into the Mississippi. He may even write another book.

“There are remarkable artifacts that we trot over everyday that are right under our feet,” says Barnhouse, who is on a mission to preserve the history of downtown Cape Girardeau.

And it’s for the gain of history that he will continue to dig, believing the famous words of his friend and mentor Mel Fisher: “Today’s the day!” Because as every treasure hunter knows, it’s in the minutes that you’re ready to give up that you keep going. Your next great find may be just around the corner.