A ring I dug up...

debodun

debodun

SF VIP
Location
way upstate in New York, USA
In the backyard of my former residence. At first I thought it was a pull tab, but slipped it in my pocket. When I washed it off, to my surprise, a beautiful ring emerged. My mom took it to a local jeweler (sadly no longer in business) and he said they were real diamonds in a platinum/iridium setting and worth around $1500. This was in the mid-1980s. Perhaps it has appreciated. There a large center stone with 8 smaller ones around it and two on each shoulder.

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debodun said:
In the backyard of my former residence. At first I thought it was a pull tab, but slipped it in my pocket. When I washed it off, to my surprise, a beautiful ring emerged. My mom took it to a local jeweler (sadly no longer in business) and he said they were real diamonds in a platinum/iridium setting and worth around $1500. This was in the mid-1980s. Perhaps it has appreciated. There a large center stone with 8 smaller ones around it and two on each shoulder.

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That must have been after you tried to trace the owner, right?
 
I'm not a jewelry person, but that must have been a happy find. Some things can be traced back to the original owner.

Who knows who had it before? Perhaps you were the beneficiary of a woman breaking up with her fiance? :)
 
Not a ring - but 6 months ago or so, I was walking my dog late at night and a little dog came rushing out of the dark and started running around my feet. I looked around, but no-one was there. It had a collar, but no name tag.

So, I scooped it up and brought it home. It spent the night playing with my dog, and running around the place. The next day I walked the dog up and down some nearby streets, and finally I heard a woman shout, "OMG! Is that my dog!" Apparently she'd had a big fight with her man the night before, and the dog had escaped. So they were back together.

I'm planning on going out later to see if I can find a $1500 ring. :D
 
It could have belonged to any of the former homeowners who have passed away now. There were some pretty wealthy people that owned the property before my parents bought it. They may have been doing some gardening and it slipped off in the dirt.

$1500 in 1985 is worth a little over $4000 in today's money, but the value of gems and precious metals fluctuates.
 
debodun said:
It could have belonged to any of the former homeowners who have passed away now. There were some pretty wealthy people that owned the property before my parents bought it. They may have been doing some gardening and it slipped off in the dirt.

$1500 in 1985 is worth a little over $4000 in today's money, but the value of gems and precious metals fluctuates.
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When you found it, was there an old lady hanging off it screaming "HELP! HELP!", or was it just the ring?
 
debodun said:
It could have belonged to any of the former homeowners who have passed away now. There were some pretty wealthy people that owned the property before my parents bought it. They may have been doing some gardening and it slipped off in the dirt.

$1500 in 1985 is worth a little over $4000 in today's money, but the value of gems and precious metals fluctuates.
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Deb you won't get it. I had some very expensive diamond jewelry set in platinum in excellent condition that was appraised for several thousand but I did not get anywhere near that for it. Young people don't care much about jewelry anymore so they don't buy it, preferring electronics instead. Unhappily beautiful valuable things like your find are not worth as much as they once were. Private collectors will still pay more for fine jewelry from the past so if you want to sell this ring you could try selling it yourself. I'd look into that avenue. I was pressed for time when I needed the money so could not sell my stuff myself and I so deeply regret that.
 
debodun said:
That's like finding a $20 bill on the floor of a store. You call out, "Did anyone lose a $20 bill?" and 25 people come running over. How do you prove it?
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I think you turn the money over to the police and then they wait a certain amount of time for an owner to come looking for it, then after that time elapses you get the money (at least that is how it worked when I was younger and a friend and I found a wallet with over a hundred dollars with no ID). The police didn't return the specific cash tho, they mailed a check for the amount of the cash.
 
debodun said:
That's like finding a $20 bill on the floor of a store. You call out, "Did anyone lose a $20 bill?" and 25 people come running over. How do you prove it?
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There's a lot of difference between that ring and a $20 bill. Everyone usually has a $20 bill in their pocket, not so much a one of a kind ring.

To me that ring is a mystery. I would love to know it's history, who it belonged to, the circumstances of how it was lost and what the loss meant to the person who lost it. Maybe she didn't miss it. Maybe she did and maybe she mourned the loss. For me, trying to find out would be an adventure.

Most likely, it wouldn't be possible but I've read stories of people who were successful in tracking owners of jewelry, medals, all sorts of things that they found. Because it was found on private property and previous owners could be identified there would be a better chance than usual of finding them and learning the story behind the loss. That is really appealing to me.
 
When you sell jewelry you usually get about a fourth of what you paid. Appraisals are for insurance purposes and tend to be higher.
 

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