Sea glass mecca

Fort Bragg, a small, hard-working town along the northern border of California holds treasures for the curious traveler. Driving north along the Pacific Coast Highway, and a couple of miles before Fort Bragg proper, I found the Sea Glass Museum set back on the east side of the road. It was there I met Captain Cass Forrington, a retired sea captain, who opened the Museum in January of 2009.

He happily greets guests who wander into his emporium, sitting quietly while working glass bits into jewelry, a big feature in the museum gift shop. There were books and videos, but the Captain was most proud of his display cases of carefully catalogued shards. Arranged by color, source and time period, they drew me in and before I knew it, an hour had passed.

I was first introduced to the joys of sea glass collecting while visiting relatives one summer near Gloucester, Mass. As we walked along one small cove, bits of patterned porcelain and chunks of frosty glass caught my attention.

It wasn't long before I was on my knees, filling buckets with my finds and managed to carry pounds back with me to California, tucked into baggies and rolled up in sweaters lining my suitcase. Now arranged by color and size, they sit in clear bottles on my office windowsill, reminding me of adventures and other places.

I hadn't expected to find a famous sea glass beach in Fort Bragg, but it turns out that the place is considered mecca for sea glass collectors. The most famous site, Glass Beach, gets over one thousand visitors a day in the summer and is the most asked about destination in town. Although some rumors claim that it's illegal to collect the glass, that's not true. What visitors and collectors need to be careful of is to select the "ripe" pieces, leaving sharper and chipped pieces to mature. At the beaches within the State Park, rangers will tell you there's no collecting due to the depletion of glass over the years. Other locations are less restrictive.

The best hunting is in coves and beaches, which sit below rock formations with unique wave patterns. They keep shards close as they’re slowly polished by sand in the surf.

Think of ship wrecks and pillaged coastal villages and it’s easy to accept that sea glass has been around as long as glass has been created. One legend has it that every time a sailor drowned at sea, mermaids would cry and their tears would wash up onto the shore. That’s a lot of lost sailors for Fort Bragg that locals claim is home to the highest concentration of sea glass in the world. Martha Stewart even backed up their claim in a 2007 edition of her “Living” magazine.

History points to several reasons for the accumulation. They include an ocean dump site after the 1906 earthquake in San Francisco that also destroyed much of the local Main Street. The site at the foot of Pine Street was an active dump until 1943. There are also legends of a glass factory that led to the deposits.

More evidence points to a landfill out Sampson Lane for refuse that couldn't be burned at home and the once thriving logging and gold rush residents, who used the beach for their refuse. Whatever the reason, during my visit to Glass Beach, just north of town, I found deep piles of smooth, sand-burnished glass bits sliding between my toes.

It was just one of three sites in the area. The one visited by Martha is at MacKerricher State Park, the others are only accessible by boat or kayak, which Captain Cass Forrington will be happy to guide you to. Given the chance, he'll also convince you to return for the Sea Glass Festival held just outside the doors of the museum. On each of the last four memorial day weekends, the Sea Glass Gallery and Museum, as a member of the North American Sea Glass Association, holds the Festival. There will be two full days of displays, art and entertainment for the collectors, the curious and crafters. 

The museum keeps growing. Its first expansion was in 2010, just a year after opening and another is on the drawing table. That is unless the Captain actually retires as he's been promising and moving closer to his kids. If you are in the area, consider dropping by. You'll be in good company as thousands make a pilgrimage to this sea glass mecca every year.

Photo courtesy of author.