What The Heck Is That? (A Continuing Series)

These images are of objects found on North Carolina beaches south of Cape Hatteras. They were posted on one of the ocean science education listserves by the Curator of Education for the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort. Any ideas of what we are looking at here? The above image measures approx. 5 3/4" in length. I figure it's bony structures of some sort of fish, probably associated with jaws, but does anyone have any specific info on species--and what part of the animal we are looking at?

Here's the other image (approx. 7" in length):


To make this more fun, I've decided to hold a contest. All guesses sent to me will be forwarded to the curator in North Carolina. Anyone who can provide positive ID of both objects with evidence that can be cross-verified will be entered into a raffle for a FREE copy of the fabulous new DK book, Reef (below). This coffee table book and DVD of amazing coral reef life was produced by DK Publishing and Scubazoo in collaboration with the Coral Reef Alliance (CORAL). A portion of every sale of Reef supports CORAL's conservation projects world-wide.

So game on! Come on, you know you wanna play!