CORSICANA, Texas — Usually, whenever Sean Bailey goes treasure hunting, he doesn’t strike gold.
“A lot of times you’ll spend a few hours out and you’ll come home with a sore back and a bag full of tin cans,” Bailey, a metal detector hobbyist, said.
That is, until about a week ago when he dug up a piece of the past.
“Yeah, it was a surprise,” Bailey said. “Everyone was kind of shocked. It was a good feeling.”
Twenty-eight years ago, Kevin Fisher, who Bailey has never met, graduated from Corsicana High School.
Fisher said graduation was bittersweet because shortly before getting his diploma he lost his 1994 class ring.
“I got the ring, as excited as a senior to get my class ring, and I lost it,” Fisher said.
Fisher, who now lives in Florida, was volunteering at Fullerton Garrity Park, just a few weeks after getting the ring, and at some point it just slipped off his finger.
“I was just devastated because I had just gotten that,” Fisher said.
For about a week he searched the park, pawn shops and the police station, but eventually gave up hope.
Until nearly three decades later, a guy with a metal detector hit pay-dirt.
Bailey, who lives in Dallas, was at Fullerton Garrity Park for a seeded search, where coins and other small valuables are purposefully placed for hunters to find.
However, Bailey found a ring that wasn’t placed in the ground by organizers.
The ring was right where Fisher lost it, buried now by a few inches of dirt.
Bailey shared the discovery on Facebook and with the help of some internet sleuths he was able to return the ring to Fisher's parents who still live in Corsicana.
“To lose something, as you said 28 years ago, and for it to be found again is a miracle almost,” Fisher said.
“And that was one of the things on my bucket list, to find a class ring and be able to return it, give it back to somebody,” Bailey said.
Bailey could’ve taken the ring to a pawn shop and likely made a nice profit, but he knew that the real value wasn’t in gold and silver.
For that, Fisher is thankful.
“It’s good knowing that there’s people with a good heart and good intentions out there still,” Fisher said.
“That’s part of the payment right there, to give something back to somebody that they lost,” said Bailey.
Fisher plans to come home to Corsicana in the coming weeks and said the first thing he plans to do is finally take a picture wearing his ring.
Then, it’s going straight into a box where only he can find it.