"We pulled up to see what it was, it was a bottle with a message in it," Byrd told WHDH-TV.
Boyd said the barnacle-encrusted bottle proved difficult to open so they took it home and broke it with a hammer, using a plastic bag to keep the broken glass contained.
The message on the note inside was brief, but meaningful: "Be safe East Boston."
The note was not signed or dated, the family said.
Byrd said her family is now planning to replicate the discovery for someone else.
"Maybe we'll go out and throw a bottle in the water and put a cool message in there," Byrd said. "It's really neat to find something like that."
A British Columbia man found an equally mysterious message in a bottle while vacationing at Osoyoos Lake. Brad Crocker said the message inside the bottle he found in September read simply: "Tyler From Coquitlam."
Crocker said he his now hoping to find Tyler to tell him what became of his bottle.
