The Long Beach Island is a favorite of many local and visiting beachgoers in the New Jersey area because it's a great place for beachcombing. A 10-year-old boy from Virginia, Noah Cordle, can now attest to that after coming across an arrowhead, a rare find that dates back around 10,000 years ago.
Last week, Cordle found the arrowhead at the surf edge in Beach Haven Community, which is believed to be from the Paelo-Indian period, various reports said.
At first, he thought what he found was a crab. The arrowhead thumped his leg as he stood by the surf edge. It was sharp and pointy so it quite hurt his leg.
As soon as he saw what bumped onto his leg, he picked up the object and showed to his parents. While his sister was unmoved by the discovery, his parents Brian and Andrea were thrilled about the rare object.
The boy’s mother then contacted the Archaeological Society of New Jersey.
Greg Lattanzi, president of said society, said to Asbury Park Press that he was “blown away” by the boy’s discovery. He added that finding such objects is rare.
He looked closely at the arrowhead with a microscope and eventually found the object built of yellow-orange jasper stone.
"The reason why it's black is because it was buried in the sand for literally thousands of years without oxygen. In the mid-section, there is a nick, and if you look closely, it's orangey-brown," he said.
Based on the construction and style of the arrow, its age was estimated between 8,000 and 11,000 years old.
The New Jersey State Museum, where Lattanzi is also assistant curator at the archaeology and ethnography bureau, has a collection of around 20-25 Paelo-Indian points mostly discovered at professional archaeological expeditions.
"Only one other one recorded had washed up on a beach, on Island Beach State Park in '94 or '95,” said Lattanzi.
Lattanzi consulted with the Historic Preservation Office, leading to a conclusion that the arrowhead may have been pushed to the shore after the replenishment project for the beach, north of Beach Haven, following the superstorm Sandy.
"About 10,000 years ago, the ocean level was a lot lower than it is today and the ocean was 100 miles farther away," Lattanzi said, adding that these early Native Americans walked on such surface before.
Gathered reports said the ancient Native Americans possibly used the object to spear fish or to hunt mastodon.
Lattanzi said the family has the entire rights to the artifact, noting the “finders keepers” law. The Cordle family, however, plans to contribute the arrowhead to a Long Beach Island museum preferably, after the boy has shown the object to his schoolmates at the Orange Hunt Elementary School in Virginia.
