For Christmas, nine-year-old Molly Sampson and her sister Natalie, 17, asked their parents for one thing: insulated waders, to “go shark’s-tooth hunting like professionals”, said Molly’s mother, Alicia Sampson.
When the waders arrived from Santa, Molly told the Guardian, she declared that she would be looking “for a Meg”, or megalodon tooth, and ventured to Maryland’s Calvert Beach to hunt fossils on Christmas Day with Natalie and their father, Bruce Sampson.
Molly said she was hoping to find teeth and other fossils to make necklaces, once the family gets more jewelry-making supplies.
There, wading in low tide amid 10F weather, Molly scored big: a 5in tooth of the Otodus megalodon shark species.
“I was amazed,” said Molly, who said she knew what she had found after learning different fossil shapes from her dad.
“My dad said I was, like, shrieking and screaming.”
“She said she got her arms all wet, but it was so worth it. The look on her face is the only thing that makes me regret not going with them because I can’t even imagine the shriek that came from her mouth,” Sampson told CBS News.
“I’m excited for her,” said Natalie with a laugh. “A little jealous.”
The family took Molly’s discovery to the Calvert Marine Museum, which confirmed it was indeed an ancient shark tooth, from the now-extinct megalodon, a type of shark that lived in seas across the world until it died out approximately 3.5m years ago.
The megalodon was regarded as one of the largest sharks in the world, and possibly the largest fish to ever exist, growing to more than 66ft in length.
Molly has reportedly found more than 400 teeth during her fossil hunts, Alicia Sampson told CBS, picking up the childhood passion of her father, who also hunted fossils as a kid.
“She has always wanted to find a meg, but for whatever reason, she spoke it into existence on Christmas morning,” Alicia said.
Stephen Godfrey, curator of paleontology at the Calvert Marine Museum, lauded Molly’s discovery as a “once-in-a-lifetime kind of find”.
“Her find is wonderful because she has an interest in paleontology and this will propel her and others her age to explore the sciences,” Godfrey told CBS.
Molly said she loves fossils because “they’re cool”.
“[They’re] from a long time ago. They’re cool. They’re old and historical.”
Despite Molly’s avid interest in fossils and the outdoors, her mother suspects she may choose a a different career path, perhaps involving music.
“She is also very good at the violin, and said she may want to teach violin like I do for a living. So she might turn out to be a good mix of her father and I if she can somehow do both,” said Alicia.
With the megalodon tooth in Molly’s bedroom amid her other fossil hunting finds, Molly said that many people in the neighborhood have come by to see the tooth, including her friends who are also amazed by her discovery.
“They’ve been really excited that I found it.”
