Someone at Mary Melfi’s church recently asked her why she was still wearing her class ring.
“I said, ‘Oh, you don’t know the story?'” she recounted.
Right as she graduated from Grandview Heights High School in 1975, Melfi exchanged class rings with her then-boyfriend and drove to visit his brother in Golden Beach, Maryland, that May.
When they got there, the two went down to the beach to enjoy their vacation and celebrate being done with high school.
Mary Melfi wears her 1975 Grandview Heights High School class ring after it was returned to her.
Melfi, who was going by her maiden name then, Masse, said her boyfriend put her ring in his pocket and went for a swim.
When he returned from the water, the ring was nowhere to be found.
“He said, ‘I put the ring in my pocket, and it’s gone,'” Melfi said.
“I just remember slugging him and saying, ‘I just got that ring.'”
At some point, she and her boyfriend broke up but decided to keep in touch. She later married Larry Melfi, a 1969 Grandview Heights graduate.
As the years went by, Melfi completely forgot about the ring.
That was until 49 years later, when she began receiving messages on Facebook claiming a man in Maryland had her ring.
That man was Shaun Tippett, who had newly picked up metal detecting as a hobby.
On Tippett’s third time out on the beach with his detector, he found the ring buried a foot in the sand in May 2024.
Larry and Mary Melfi are pictured with Mary’s ring after it was returned to them by Shaun Tippett.
Instead of keeping the ring for himself as a souvenir or trying to sell his spoils, the amateur treasure hunter took to the internet and researched Grandview Heights.
He found a yearbook for the central Ohio school’s class of 1975 and located the only person whose name matched the initials engraved on the ring, MVM, for Mary Virginia Masse.
“I had a couple instant messages, and I reached out to them. One of them was my brother. He said, ‘Yeah, some guy in Maryland said he found your ring,'” Melfi said.
All these years later, Melfi has the ring on her finger once again.
Mary Melfi’s class ring is pictured with her initials engraved on the inside. MVM stands for Mary Virginia Masse, her maiden name.
Searching for treasure and finding generosity
Tippett mailed the ring to Melfi’s former flame in central Ohio, who then sent it down to her in St. Augustine, Florida, where Melfi and her husband now live.
“I’m glad she’s happy. I’m glad she got her ring back. It’s just a cool story. I enjoy telling it,” Tippett said.
“People ask me, ‘What’s the best thing you’ve found?’ And that’s what I always tell them.”
Shaun Tippett was looking for treasures in the sand on the day he found Mary Melfi’s class ring.
Now, Melfi is preparing to attend her 50th high school reunion in Grandview Heights in early September with a story to tell.
“I am now the proud owner of my GHHS 1975 class ring that was lost when I was a senior in HS while visiting a beach in Maryland. A kind soul who was metal detecting found my ring,” Melfi wrote in the Grandview Heights 60’s Classmates Facebook group.
“The beach sand took very good care of it . . . almost 50 years later! GO CATS!”
She will also return to Ohio as the owner of both rings — as she never returned her boyfriend’s ring all those years ago.
“One time, I said, ‘You know, sweetheart, you should send his ring back,” Larry Melfi joked.
His wife playfully interjected.
“I said, ‘Well, he may think it’s over if I send it back.’ It’s always kind of a joke.”
The Center for HumanKindness at The Columbus Foundation.
This article was made possible by support from the Center for HumanKindness at The Columbus Foundation, which has partnered with The Columbus Dispatch to profile those making our community a better place. Help us inspire kindness by suggesting people, initiatives or organizations for Reporter Sophia Veneziano to profile. She can be reached at sveneziano@dispatch.com. Learn more at Dispatch.com/Kindness. The Dispatch retains full editorial independence for all content.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Grandview Heights class ring returned before 50th class reunion