The story starts out with Dan asking permission to detect the yard of a very
beautiful old farm house. The owner, Dan relates, was very friendly and granted
permission without hesitation.

   “Before you get started would you do me a quick favor?”asked the farmer.

    “My son lost his class ring near the barn over ten years ago and we haven’t been able to
locate it. We even had someone else look for it with a metal detector but they didn’t
have any luck, Would you give it a try?”

    Dan fired up his trusty XLT and started working the area that the farmer had
pointed out.  He  was only  at it a short time when he got a good solid hit. The
XLT showed an icon and V.D.I. number that Dan would have expected from a
gold class ring. Sure enough, it was the missing ring! Excited about the recovery
Dan ran to the house and banged on the door to report the good news! The farmer
was so happy ! As he thanked him, he proceeded to tell  Dan the whole story. It
seems that his son was afraid to disappoint his parents by telling them the news of
losing his new ring so he never told them.

    The ring was lost, they discovered, soon after he got it. “My son was pitching
hay to the horses when the ring flew off,” said the father. With a lump in his throat
and eyes swollen with tears the father related how a friend of their boy told them
about it at the son’s funeral. It seems the boy had been tragically killed soon after
the ring was lost and the family had been looking for it ever since.

     With the farmer’s blessing, Dan proceeded with his plans to detect the yard of
the old farm. Shortly after he started detecting again the mother drove up. She
walked out to Dan, and started to share the ring story, with plans to ask Dan to
search for it. “I have already found it,” announced Dan.

    As she too began to weep, she gave Dan a big hug then ran to the house to see the
ring. Dan asked if he could borrow the ring to bring to the club and the couple said,
“ Sure!” But as he thought about it, he decided that this ring is truly too priceless
and it  would be foolish to risk its loss again.

    Dan told us that he found only newer coins in the yard that day, but he said it was
his best day of detecting yet!
    By the way , have you heard of any archaeologist returning anything lately or
is it just us renegade treasure hunters?