Earlier this month, master SCUBA diver Annette Spaulding of Rockingham found a mysterious rock carving beneath the Connecticut River that she had been searching for since 1979.
Spaulding had found references to the petroglyph -- depicting a face and possibly carved by native Americans -- dating back more than 200 years. She reasoned that since the river was dammed in 1909, the artifact was now likely underwater.
After hundreds of dives over the years, she finally found the 6-inch petroglyph on August 9th. She descibed the moment of discovery to VPR's Vermont Edition:
"I was really shocked. I was getting low on air, it was near the end of my dive. And I started scanning another whole area, another whole ledge of the area I've been searching for many years. And all of a sudden, right before my face as the silt settled for a moment, I had this single petroglyph staring back at me. I couldn't believe it; I was so excited."
Spaulding took photographs and video documenting the petroglyph. And she's notified the state archaeologist's office of the discovery. She told VPR that she is known to her friends as "Indiana Jones."
