The Rapid City Public Library has helped solve a 40 year old case of lost and found.
Vesper Wright lost her class ring in the 1972 Black Hills flood when her entire home was swept away and then later demolished.
Four decades later she has her ring back.
In the aftermath of the 1972 flood Neil Ramlow was helping dig mud out of a damaged mobile home. He found a small box containing two class rings and a bracelet. Ramlow held on to the items for 40 years trying to find the owners. He had no luck, until Laura Johnson from South Dakota Magazine suggested that he contact the Rapid City Public Library. Leanna Bussell at the library took up the search. She pulled out the Rapid City High School yearbook for 1968 and compared the initials V.M. on the class ring with all those in the graduating class. She quickly found a match – and 40 years later Vesper Wright of Rapid City got her lost ring back.
“I was between tears and laughing," says Wright. "I mean you just feel kind of giddy, because it’s something you knew was gone, or thought it was gone forever, and then all of the sudden here it is,” she adds.
The other ring and bracelet belonged to John Rowe of Rapid City. Wright says he is set to get his lost items returned shortly as well.