A 50-year-old find in a centuries-old farmhouse in Greenville has led the homeowners to a special discovery this holiday season.

“The house was built in 1798 during the time of the second U.S. president,” says homeowner, Angel Scalice. “It was the original, oldest framed house in the town.”

Scalice and her longtime boyfriend, Mark Braniecki, have been happily renovating their old farmhouse on Old Mountain Road for 10 years.

“Every year we do another room. We just did the kitchen,” Braniecki says.

This time, they were recently working on their stairwell when they found something special.

“I started taking off the sheetrock and this note was under here,” says Braniecki.

The note was from the old homeowners whom the couple knew nothing about, in a letter dated Sept. 16, 1973.

It read, “Inge Nordquist and Felix Heufurger are happily rebuilding their 200-year-old house, to be their home, after their marriage later this year. Marie and Lars Nordquist, parents of Inge, have been of great help in this task of love. May God bless us and keep our marriage and this home happy and safe.”

The couple quickly shared the note to a local Facebook group in hopes of connecting with the family.

“The daughter of Felix reached out to me and gave me some of the history and then I started private messaging her,” Scalice says.

The two families exchanged old photos and information about the house. Scalice and Braniecki found out Nordquist and Heufurger died several years ago, but loved the old farmhouse as much as they do.

“She said they had a lovely marriage and that this was a project for them their entire life living here,” Scalice says.

Scalice and Braniercki plan to incorporate their find, as they have with others, into their renovations, and say they hope to find more as they carry on the tradition of fixing their old house.

“It feels like the house loves it. It’s just happy and keeps giving us more treasures,” Scalice says.

The couple also found the Heufurger’s names with the date 1973 on the brick they exposed. They say previously, they found old posters from the 1920s in walls from a local theater that no longer exists.