Lost Texas A&M “Aggie” Class Ring…Found and Returned Four Years Later!!
Steve Thomas
Dunedin Ring Finder lostringdunedin.com
“It’s Only Lost Until I Find It!
Lost a ring or other metal valuable at the beach or in a grassy or sandy area? Jewelry slip off of you while working outside, playing with the dog or swimming? Please contact me ASAP at (843) 995-4719 or @dunedinringfinder. I offer a FREE metal detecting service, reward optional but appreciated upon recovery!
My wife and I recently spent a week in Texas with our daughter, son-in-law and two grandsons. Part of the trip was a three day beach stay in Port Aransas along with other family members on both sides including our son and his wife. Of course, any opportunity I have to do detecting on a beach I try to take advantage of it so I carried along my Minelab Equinox 900 with me.
While detecting on the beach at Port Aransas the first day, my finds had been a handful of coins, a bling ring, a bling earring and an assortment of pull tabs. After a few hours of this, I was about a half mile north of the property where we were staying when I swung my detector over a target in the wet sand about four inches down on mid tide. The number on the display and the tone in my headphones gave me indications that the target was probably a beer cap but when I scooped it out of the wet sand I was pleasantly surprised to find what appeared to be a small gold class ring! After a quick wash of the ring in the salty water, I could see that I had found a Texas A&M class ring from 2021 and the full name of the owner was inscribed inside! For those of you who don’t know how important the achievement of a class ring is to an Aggie grad, you can find out more by searching “Aggie Ring Tradition” and the “Aggie Network”. To say it’s a big deal is a huge understatement.
I returned to where we were staying and began my research. I found two people on Facebook who had the same first and last names as what was inscribed in the ring and who lived in that part of Texas but only one of the two had graduated in 2021. I reached out to her through Facebook messenger (her first name is Amber) but I did not receive a response. The next morning, I decided to post the find on a Facebook page called “Aggie Ring Lost and Found” and it wasn’t long before some of Amber’s family and friends let her know that her ring had been found! Amber then responded to me and of course was shocked that I had found it because she lost it while playing beach volleyball about four years before and had only had it about four months. She had given it up for lost and had purchased a replacement ring. I told her that I was surprised it was still there because of how many people metal detect on beaches now. Amber asked me if I could return the ring to her brother Matthew who was in College Station for his last semester at Texas A&M when my family returned from our stay at Port Aransas and I promised her that I would. The day after our family returned to College Station from Port Aransas, I met Amber’s brother Matthew and returned the ring to him so he could deliver it to Amber who was living and working in San Antonio.
Amber, I was so happy that I could return your precious Aggie ring to you!
Ally reached out to me, as a last-chance effort, in trying to get her precious engagement ring back, that unfortunately was dropped in the bay, on a nice Jersey Shore summer afternoon. She was very concerned there was no hope, as it had already been in the water for close to a week. I asked why she waited so long to call me, and her reply was « another local ring finder looked and had no luck ». I usually wont make it a practice to follow up behind another ring finder, but Ally hadn’t heard any more from him about his follow-up search, and was desperate at this point. After quite a long conversation, I decided Ally really needed me, and agreed to do the recovery. She sent me all the pertinent information, and I assured her I would go at the first possible brake in the, wind, and weather. The tides would also have to coincide with the search day. Our first conversation was 11 PM the day before, when I told her I would check in with her next morning. The following morning at 5 AM, as I was getting ready for work, I looked the weather over real good, and guess what, » today is the day ». I text Ally and told her I was going for it today before low tide, she was thrilled with the timely updates, which she was not used to. I suited up with all my gear, and proceeded with the 1/3 mile walk in the water, just to get to the location it was lost. Once I was set up, I started to do a tight grid search, clearing over 20 signals, all of which had potential, to ensure her ring wasn’t missed by an overpowering signal. It really seemed like to many targets for an area that was supposedly searched, just 6 days prior, even though this is a huge boaters party area. And no they were not recent drops, as they were all down at least 4″ plus. I was super confident of my location, so I kept plugging along and after about 45 minutes my Metal Detector screamed out a low consistent tone, that almost immediately had Ally’s ring written all over it. While clearing the sand from my scoop, I could feel the tink, tink, tink of her ring, but at first glance, I didn’t see it hiding under the shells. But I knew that tink was NOT a shell, and gave the scoop a little wiggle, and there it was, WOW, was this a heart testing moment, seeing the diamonds sparkling back at me. My gut was right, I was in the right spot, and NJ Ring Finder just made someone’s last chance hopes a true reality. !!!!
Caitlin called In reference to locating her necklace, that was lost on the beach. She told me she had left to go home, but knew the exact location where it could be. She explained that she took the necklace off, and placed them inside her hat, which she then placed on her blanket for safe keeping. When she was getting ready to leave for the day, she had forgotten about the necklace, and placed the hat on her head and started walking up the dune path to head home. It was very windy that day and at one point the hat had blown off her head. After retrieving the hat, she continued over the walkway. When she got to the top, she realized she had placed her necklace in the hat and it was gone. She went back to take a look he wasn’t able to find anything. I was able to go the following morning, and after about 20 minutes I was able to locate the necklace. Unfortunately, the cross was nowhere to be found. My guess is the cross never came out of the hat and was lost in a different location.