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Lost class ring returned to woman 36 years later

A class ring lost in a New York restaurant bathroom in 1984 was returned to its owner 36 years later. Photo by lisabussell/Pixabay.com
A class ring lost in a New York restaurant bathroom in 1984 was returned to its owner 36 years later. Photo by lisabussell/Pixabay.com

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Feb. 20 (UPI) -- A woman who lost her class ring in a New York restaurant bathroom in 1984 was reunited with the item thanks to an air conditioner repairman's years-long search.

Holly Ann Green said he removed several rings, including her class ring from New Jersey's Paramus High School, in the bathroom of a New York restaurant near Washington Square Park and didn't realize until later that she had left her rings on the sink.

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She returned to the eatery, bit her rings were already gone, she said.

"It was a Class of 1983 ring and I lost it with all of my other rings in a bathroom in Manhattan on June 26, 1984," Green told NJ.com.

Dean Ferraro, an air conditioning repairman, said he was working on a supermarket's refrigeration case in Melville, on Long Island, about a year later when he found the ring at the bottom of the case.

The ring was inscribed with the name Holly Ann Green, but Ferraro said he was unable to track the woman down despite attempts to contact Paramus High School and other members of the graduating class.

Ferraro said it wasn't until decades later that he was able to find a Florida address listed on a people-finding website. He wrote a letter that arrived at Green's mother's house.

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"I was wondering if you are the 'Holly Green' who graduated from Paramus HS in 1983. If you are, I might have something of yours," he wrote in the letter.

Green said she was initially suspicious of the letter.

"I thought it was either a scam or somebody wanted to find out my phone number," Green said.

Ferraro and Green were eventually able to connect on the phone and he revealed that he had her ring.

The ring was placed in the mail and Green received it Saturday.

"I was so excited to hear from him," Green said. "I never thought I'd see this ring again and I can't explain how happy I am. I would love to know how it got from lower Manhattan to Suffolk County."

A Maine woman's lost ring recently took an even longer and more bizarre journey home. Debra McKenna said the class ring that was a gift from her boyfriend was lost in a department store bathroom in 1973 and turned up 47 years later when a man using a metal detector found it buried in a park in Kaarina, Finland.

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