56 years and millions of teeth later, this Myrtle Beach man has become a shark expert
Tom Pierce’s hands move with precision as he wraps each black shark’s tooth with wire, laying them in a row on the glass counter.
The process only takes a few minutes to create each piece of jewelry, but that’s probably because Pierce has been doing this for 56 years.
Pierce works in a small space inside the Gay Dolphin, a popular tourist destination that sits along North Ocean Boulevard in downtown Myrtle Beach. He’s surrounded by walls covered with shark jaws and multiple shelves of shark teeth that have come from the mouths of shark species around the country – including those that swim off the coast of the Carolinas.
The 76-year-old is considered a shark’s tooth expert – offering information about each tooth, from a great white, to a tiger shark, to a megalodon, that he sells at his business Trader Bill Shark Teeth – the name of the original owner.
Pierce’s knowledge is so vast that he often works with the Smithsonian Institute, which has the largest shark’s teeth collection in the world, to consult on identifying items.
“We have a nice working relationship,” Pierce said.
A huge glass jar sits on the counter by the cash register. It’s filled to the top with shark’s teeth and bits of shell. They were put there by locals and visitors who have come to Trader Bill’s for more than 50 years.
He often has grandparents come in with their grandchildren to show them the jar where they put their teeth.
Pierce has no idea how many are in the jar; he’s never counted. But it’s a testament to just how popular the business is, having sold millions of teeth over the years.
“We’ve seen a lot behind this counter,” Pierce said.
He came for one summer and then never left
Eight-year-old Maximus Miles of Pittsburgh stares at the many shark teeth that line the shelves in the glass display cases. He walks from case to case before finally making a decision about what tooth he wants.
Maximus points to the tooth. That’s a Mako shark tooth, Pierce said. It’s one of the fastest swimming sharks, he explains, as he wraps the tooth in a bag and hands it to the young boy.
Another customer asks about the different shark jaws that hang on the wall behind the counter. “How much is that one?” the man asks.
Pierce, as he gives the price, tells the man that it is the mouth of a Bramble shark, a fish that is rarely encountered because it swims so close to the ocean floor in tropical, warm waters.
Pierce has gained his shark knowledge from working at Trader Bill’s. Originally from Greenville, he came to Myrtle Beach in 1969 with his best friend.
They lived with Bill Swanson, and his wife, who operated the business. Pierce spent one summer and then came back the next, then, after he graduated college, “I never left,” he said.
Pierce used those summers to save money for college, but eventually he returned to the area, continuing to work with the Swansons.
When Bill Swanson passed away in the 1970s, and his wife in the 1990s, Pierce bought the business, but kept the name as a tribute to the man who he said was like a second father to him.
There were so many shark teeth when Pierce began working that he and his friend would collect them in “double handfuls,” placing them in their pockets. However, they would often forget to remove them and Swanson’s wife would get upset because she had to pick them all out of the clothing when she would do laundry.
In the 1970s, Swanson bought every shark tooth that was brought to him and then all he could get from a North Carolina quarry, Pierce said. The reason? “You never knew if they would quit washing up,” Pierce said.
Pierce doesn’t go out looking for teeth anymore.
However, people still bring their ocean treasures to him. In addition to the numerous teeth, he has fossilized horse teeth, elephant teeth, mastodon teeth, and even a dinosaur egg.
Depending on what you are looking for, items can get pricey. A megalodon tooth can run anywhere from $100 to more than $500.
The megalodon teeth are brought in by divers who find them in local rivers or about 30 miles offshore where there is a ledge that produces the teeth, Pierce said.
Pierce said that there’s no one better spot than the other to find shark’s teeth in the Myrtle Beach area. And even if he did have a “honey hole,” Pierce wouldn’t tell anyone.
“When you start telling people,” it becomes the “worst spot” instead of the best, he said.
‘My little corner of the world’
Bill Swanson was actually among the many carnies – traveling carnival workers – who would come to Myrtle Beach in the 1950s and set up trailers near the Pavilion, according to Buz Plyler, owner of the Gay Dolphin.
Swanson had a trailer beside the original oceanfront gift shop, called Shell Craft, Plyler said. Plyler’s father, Justin Plyler, started the business in the 1940s. However, when Hurricane Hazel hit the area in 1954, the store was destroyed.
When the business was rebuilt and named the Gay Dolphin in 1956, Swanson was given his own space inside the store, Buz Plyler said.
Swanson started out making sweetheart pins, jewelry that included the names of people who were in a relationship, and the pins sold well, Plyler said. However, when Plyler was 8 or 9, he found a megalodon tooth.
He took it to Swanson, who wrapped it in gold wire. Plyler then gave it to an employee with the amusement park across from the Pavilion and it brought people into the store who wanted shark’s teeth jewelry, Plyler said.
Swanson realized he could sell 10 times more of the teeth than he could the pins, Plyler said. “We sold a ton of them,” Plyler said.
Swanson then began buying shark’s teeth from locals for a dime or a quarter.
The shark’s tooth counter has been “a successful thing for both of us,” Plyler said of Trader Bill’s and Pierce.
Pierce can make jewelry out of the teeth that he has or customize pieces based on what customers bring in.
Over the years he has made many creations, including pieces for the World’s Smallest Woman. He continues to see the fascination with the creatures, pointing out how many people became obsessed with sharks after the first “Jaws” movie came out in 1975.
Through it all, Pierce continues to do what he loves, what made him stay in Myrtle Beach.
“This,” he said standing behind his counter, “is my little corner of the world.”
