Class ring lost four years ago found in gravel parking lot

Feb. 6 (UPI) -- A woman who lost her class ring in a gravel parking lot in South Carolina said the memento was found four years later in the same place where it fell out of her backpack.

Maggie Payne said she took off her 2016 Clemson University class ring when she was climbing the rock wall at the school's Fike Recreation Center in 2016, and when she went to put it back on later she discovered it was no longer inside her backpack.

Payne eventually purchased a replacement ring, but a few weeks ago she received a surprise Facebook message from Clemson student Catherine Kenyon.

Kenyon said her friend, Leah Wiitablake, found the ring in the gravel parking lot outside the Fike Recreation Center in January.

"She assumes all the rain at the beginning of the semester must have washed it up," Kenyon told The Greenville News and Independent Mail.

Payne said she was skeptical at first, but the ring still has the inscription of her name, sorority letters, graduation year and degree.

"It looks like a fossil that's been dug up from hundreds of years ago," Payne said. "I kind of like that it's a little beat up."