MARINETTE, Wis. (NBC 26) -- If you're looking for something underwater, there's a good chance one local diver will find it.
"Don't go in the river, because Eddie's gonna track it down," Marinette resident Gary Edwards said. "I couldn't believe it. I mean after a year and half, who ever expects someone to find something at the bottom of the Menominee River?"
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In late 2019, Edwards was vacationing in Florida when his house was robbed. And over a year later, a Marinette diver found his stolen items near Menekaunee Harbor.
"We got to the bottom of him finding the box that was stolen," Edwards said. "Who the heck did that? Well there's the man right there, Eddie Bieber."
Back in July, Ed Bieber stumbled upon newspaper clippings and hundreds of dollars worth of jewelry after diving near the Hattie Street Bridge.
"I saw a couple logs down there with this pillow case tied shut," Bieber said. "And as soon as I grabbed it, I could feel there's two different boxes in there. ... I swam to the shore, took off all my heavy gear and set the camera down and started opening the different boxes. And the metal box, right away I noticed the obituaries. And I was like 'oh man, this isn't good.'"
Bieber posted a video on YouTube and his friend recognized a name on the obituaries: 'Edwards.' So she told the robbery victim to give Bieber a call.
"I invited him [Edwards] over, and right away he knew from the laminated obituaries and memory cards," Bieber said. "He's like 'I did these personally.'"
"I thought everything was gone and forgotten," Edwards said. "And luckily, he got in contact with me as the good guy he is."
For Bieber, it's just a hobby; a hobby that helped change someone's life.
"I could've brought it to the pawn shop and said 'how much can you give me for this?'" he said. "This is worth $400, $600. I could've done that and I think a lot of people would. But it feels good just to be able to give back to the community."
Bieber also started “Bieber’s Underwater Recovery” as a side job. He is willing to take private, paid requests from those looking to locate lost goods, but he spends most of his time diving regularly into Northeast Wisconsin water bodies in an effort to clean up waste.
The Marinette diver posts his work on social media as 'Ed the Diver.'
