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Utahn reunited with class ring a decade after theft when memento resurfaces in Minnesota mine

Posted at 9:58 PM, Jun 14, 2017
and last updated 2017-06-14 23:58:50-04

SANDY, Utah -- A Brighton High School graduate has quite a lost and found story after her class ring, stolen more than a decade ago, was returned to her from a stranger in a completely unexpected place far from Utah.

How it was found highlights the goodness in people.

For Jamie Kilgore, high school brings up fond memories.

“Some of our most important years,” she said.

The 2005 Brighton graduate said her parents bought her a white gold, diamond and blue-jeweled ring as a gift her senior year, to commemorate that special time in Kilgore’s life.

“So many good memories, and so many great friends,” she said.

But in 2006, one year after Kilgore graduated, she said the ring disappeared from her parents’ home in Sandy. After having friends over one night, she said she realized someone stole it.

“I thought it was gone forever,” Kilgore said.

Fast forward 11 years, the ring now a distant memory. Then, Kilgore got a message on Facebook from a woman in Minnesota, and attached were pictures of her ring.

“I was shocked, speechless,” she said.

“I was like, ‘Does this happen to be your ring?’” Recounted Kassandra Bjorgo, the woman who sent the message.

Bjorgo works at Lake Vermilion-Soudan Underground Mine State Park, more than 1,300 miles away from Salt Lake City. The park sits in the northern part of Minnesota.

Last year, Bjorgo said, someone found the ring a half a mile underground in the park’s mine, during a tour.

It sat in the park office for nearly a year, until Bjorgo said she noticed no one ever claimed it.

“I was finally like… ‘Whose ring is this? What are we going to do with it?’ I was like, ‘It's been sitting here forever,’” Bjorgo said.

She and another park employee used the ring’s engravings as clues: Brighton, 2005. And inside the ring in microscopic cursive, the name Jamie Kilgore.

“It took like five of us to figure out what on earth it said in there, so I took a long shot,” she said.

That shot in the dark, brought Kilgore a world of light.

“Tears coming out of my eyes,” she said of seeing her long lost ring again.

“I was beside myself,” she said. “It was extraordinary.”

Kilgore may never know how her ring got to a Minnesota mine, but her small treasure is back where it belongs.

“It means so much that somebody would go out of their way to look me up,” she said, of her gratefulness.

And now, the ring has a new story—it not only symbolizes Kilgore’s time in high school, but it also serves as a reminder of human kindness, and miracles.

As a thank you for returning the ring, Kilgore said she sent Bjorgo a gift.