Purple Pearl Was Almost Tossed

(CBS/AP)  A clam that a Portsmouth, R.I. couple thought was rotten turned out to hold a rare gem: a purple pearl that could be worth lots of money.

It happened earlier this month when Barbara Krensavage brought home about four dozen quahogs from a Newport seafood restaurant.

"I felt like having clams and I went out and we got 50 of them," she told Tracy Smith on The Early Show Tuesday. "They tasted so good, I went out the next day in a blizzard to get more."

Her husband, Thaddeus or "Ted" Krensavage, was shucking them when he came across one he thought was diseased.

"As I opened it," he told Smith, "I noticed this — I didn't know what it was — a hard thing that isn't supposed to be in clams, I knew, or thought, anyway. And I scraped it into a plate of discarded clam shells … and was planning on throwing it out. Then, Barbara came over."

She continued the story for Smith: "I said, 'Let me see that thing. It might be a pearl!' "

Upon closer inspection, the couple realized it was not only a pearl, but a purple one.

"We're finding out there's only a handful on earth," Barbara Krensavage said. "We were excited, biting it and everything."

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