A Florida grandfather just stumbled onto something that could rewrite local history.
He was doing what Americans have done for generations – passing down fishing traditions to the next generation.
And Thomas Peterson made one discovery while fishing with his grandson that has archaeologists scrambling to investigate.
A "Florida redneck" finds what government experts missed
Thomas Peterson calls himself a "Florida redneck" and he’s been fishing the same spots around Aripeka for a decade with his grandson.
That’s 50 miles north of Tampa, in case you’re wondering – the kind of place where regular folks still know how to fish and aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty.
Peterson was teaching his grandson the ropes in the shallow waters when something caught his eye during low tide.
"I look down and I see this boat has this green stuff going on . . . it’s like shag carpet," Peterson told FOX 13 Tampa Bay.
His grandsons thought it was just an old dock.
But Peterson knew better.
"My boys, they say it’s a dock," Peterson explained. "I say no, it’s not a dock, it’s a boat. That’s pretty cool that I found history."
The discovery that has experts talking
What Peterson found were wooden beams and planks barely visible in Aripeka’s mud flats.
The shallow water revealed long, parallel timbers that clearly showed the remains of a boat or ship.
But here’s where it gets interesting.
Peterson also found a piece of purplish glass at the site – possibly a remnant from an old liquor bottle.
He thinks he’s discovered a rum-runner, one of those ships used to smuggle illegal alcohol.
And get this – Peterson believes it predates Prohibition, which would make this wreck potentially 150 years old.
"I’ve been fishing out there for 10 years with my grandson," Peterson said. "He caught his first big redfish there."
For a decade, this piece of American history was sitting right there in plain sight.
It took a grandfather teaching his grandson to fish to finally notice what nobody else had bothered to look at.
Now the government wants to take over
Here’s where things get complicated.
Local archaeologists are now "taking a look" at Peterson’s discovery to "verify its origin."
Then it gets handed over to the state of Florida.
State regulations mean Peterson can’t dig around the site himself – only credentialed experts are allowed to excavate historical finds.
Translation: the regular guy who actually found the thing gets pushed aside so the experts can take credit.
Look, Peterson isn’t asking to strip-mine the site or sell tickets to tourists.
The man just wants recognition for discovering a piece of history while doing what generations of American grandfathers have done – teaching kids to fish.
But now the bureaucrats have to get involved because, apparently, finding old boats requires government oversight.
"That’s pretty cool that I found history," Peterson said.
Notice he said he found history.
Not some PhD with a government grant.
Not some university research team.
A Florida fisherman who knows his local waters better than any expert ever will.
The real treasure isn’t what you think
Peterson doesn’t think there’s any hidden treasure aboard this old wreck.
But he’s found something more valuable than gold or silver.
"Whether or not they pull the vessel out of the water, Peterson says that it will always be his treasure," FOX 13 reported.
The treasure is the time spent with his grandson, passing down traditions that have been part of American life for centuries.
The treasure is knowing that regular people can still make discoveries that matter.
The treasure is proving that sometimes the best historians aren’t the ones with fancy degrees – they’re the ones who actually spend time in the places where history happened.
Shipwrecks get discovered fairly regularly along coastal areas.
Earlier this year, archaeologists found four 18th-century shipwrecks in North Carolina’s Cape Fear region.
In April, a centuries-old shipwreck was found in Spain.
But those were found by professional archaeologists doing professional archaeology.
Peterson’s discovery is different because it represents something the experts always miss – the value of local knowledge and family tradition.
This grandfather has been fishing these waters for ten years.
He knows every tide, every current, every spot where the fish bite.
And it turns out he also knows where history is hiding in plain sight.
You want to know what this really means?
It means there’s still room in America for regular people to matter.
Despite all the credentialed experts and government bureaucrats who think they have a monopoly on discovering the past, sometimes it takes a Florida redneck with a fishing pole to find what everyone else missed.
That’s the kind of American story that doesn’t make the evening news very often anymore.
But it should.
¹ Andrea Margolis, "Man fishing with grandson uncovers mystery wreckage in mud flats, archaeologists investigating," Fox News, September 8, 2025.
² Lloyd Sowers, "’I found history’ fisherman comes across unusual discovery in Hernando County," FOX 13 Tampa Bay, August 25, 2025.
