More than 70 percent of Earth is covered in water, so it’s not surprising that there are many treasures lost to time in lakes, rivers and oceans.

One such treasure is the Doves Press typeface—and it has quite a curious history. T.J. Cobden-Sanderson and Emery Walker founded Doves Press in England in 1900. They printed books by setting individual letters in place, meaning each letter required its own metal piece of type. They worked to create a beautiful and unique typeface, and there may have been as many as 500,000 pieces of Doves type at one time.

Unfortunately, the Press’s founders had a bitter falling out and closed the business. In 1917, Cobden-Sanderson publicly announced that Doves Press was closed, and its type had been “dedicated & consecrated” to the River Thames. What Cobden-Sanderson was saying was that he had thrown all of the metal pieces into the river!

Cobden-Sanderson wanted to keep the type from his former partner so much that he made 170 trips to carry all of those pieces to the river! Despite the great lengths he took to dump the metal pieces, Cobden-Sanderson documented in his journals the exact date and location where he dumped the type.

The type remained hidden in the river for nearly 100 years. Robert Green, a type enthusiast who was in art school, became fascinated by the Doves Press type. In 2014, Green retraced Cobden-Sanderson’s steps and began searching for the lost type. He quickly found a few of the missing metal pieces and wanted to see what else he could find. Green worked with the port authority to enlist the help of scuba divers, who used buckets and sieves to continue the search.

The team ultimately discovered 151 individual pieces of type in the river. Some of those pieces have been on display at an exhibit in London—returning something that was lost for nearly a century and making it the first time a full set of Doves type has ever been exhibited!