For years he searched for his father’s lost wedding ring in the garden of the family home and, finally, managed to find it after half a century. The incredible story comes from Ohio, in the United States, where 64-year-old Jeff Arnett, with the help of a metal detector, managed to recover the faith that his father John had lost between the end of the 70s and the beginning of the 80s.
The lost ring
John Arnett, a noncommissioned officer in the Ohio National Guard, lost the ring while he was washing his Plymouth Volaré in front of his home in Swanton. The man, convinced that the jewel had slipped somewhere in the meadow, had never stopped thinking about that ring. About a year and a half before his death, he asked his son to make an attempt to track him down using a metal detector. As reported by the New York Times, Jeff Arnett kept his promise, starting the research in the autumn of 2013, shortly after the death of his parent, who died at the age of 78 due to pulmonary fibrosis.
Years of research
Despite the difficult and unsuccessful start of the first attempts, from that moment the search for faith turned into a real obsession: in the following years, Arnett returned several times to the garden of his childhood home, concentrating his efforts especially in the spring and autumn periods. Over time, the land yielded around 150 objects, including nails, nuts, bolts and some coins, but no trace of the jewel.
The twist
The turning point occurred in August this year. Arnett decided to try the feat again using a more sophisticated metal detector, received as a gift from his brothers. There was also a certain urgency: the childhood home, now owned by the family’s former pastor, would soon be put up for sale, and the 64-year-old feared that the advent of new owners could prevent him from accessing the land.
What appeared to be one of the last opportunities turned out to be the winning one. Just five minutes into the search, the instrument reported an object about 20 centimeters deep: it was a 14-karat white gold ring. Initially Arnett feared it could be simple costume jewellery, but to be sure he turned to his 90-year-old mother Carol, who recognized it immediately.
Mom’s confirmation
The definitive confirmation came from the comparison with the photo album of the parents’ wedding, celebrated in 1957, in which the wedding ring was clearly visible on John’s finger. “When I took it and put it on my finger, I realized that my father had been the last to wear it and I was the first after him – confessed Jeff Arnett –. It was the closest thing to being able to touch my father again.” The ring is now in the man’s house, in a box on the desk, next to a watch that belonged to the parent.