George Hicks, Author at The Ring Finders

Lost Keys at Beach – Found and Returned

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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Jake called me at 7:30AM as I was getting ready for work and asked if I could help find his lost car keys. I asked a bit about the location, not far from me, but I was just getting ready for work. (Yeah, some of still work, lol) Since I know a couple other RingFinders work the beaches pretty exclusively, I asked if he could contact one of them, and he said he did, but they were not available to help.
They keys were for an older truck he was restoring, and only had the one set. He had lost them earlier the previous evening and had been there all evening and even stayed the night with a rake, searching and raking the sand to find them!

Since it sounded like he knew the approximate location, I figured it was an easy find (Never is, so I should just take that out of my vocabulary!) and said “I’m not going to leave you hanging, be there shortly!”
Headed down, and met him 2o minutes later, and found it was a big area where he had been raking for hundreds of yards!  Basically, somewhere between the parking lot and the shore, in a 50-Yard-wide swath and also they were on a huge sand wall at the beach as well. He also had his truck towed out of the lot so had to pay for that!
I searched over an hour in grid formation with my Equinox 800 and 15″ coil. Found about $1:30 in change, but no keys, and it was getting hot!  Looking at it on Google Maps, it was about 24,000 Square Feet of area to search!
I decided to search the large sand wall which was steep, and searched the top of it then walking parallel to it several feet down the bank, I found them!
Jake was over on the beach further still raking away, so I headed over and said “Man, I just can’t do that sand wall, it’s so steep and I am beat!” he said well, I guess they must be somewhere further, I will keep raking, and then I said “Unless they look like these?”  He was so happy and amazed I found them!

So rewarding to have found them and was able to go into work a little late, but with a smile and sense of accomplishment to start my day and his!

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Lost Coin Stash Found! 50 Years later! Silver Found

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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87 Year old Dr. M. Called me a week ago, and said he had buried a bag of Silver Coins in his yard 50 years ago, and now wanted to find them. He said he knew the area, but can’t pinpoint it, and also he remembered “Putting a bunch of old nails all over the bag” when he buried it so it could later be found, lol (as if the Silver wouldn’t be enough) but thinking ahead!

I arranged to meet a few days later, and knew the area he lived in was a very rural hilly area, however, I did not anticipate the terrain where he buried it!
He and his wife, buried these Silver Coins in 1972, when the economy was sketchy, and since his wife has now passed, he was the sole person to remember it was buried there.  Unbeknownst to me, some interesting details he left out about the coins, but I had enought to go on, so arrived at 3PM.

Not exactly a normal yard, lol.  It was down a steep hillside, where he remembered burying it near an Avocado Tree Stump. He had his gardener clear out as much Ivy and overgrowth in the area he remembered it, though a ton of stumps and bushes still remained. I took my Equinox 800, 15″ Coil, Park 1 Mode and started searching. Found usual beer cans, wire, old broken toys, sprinker fittings but nothing screaming out like a bag of Silver.  2 Hours in 92 degree heat climbing in bushes up and down this hillside, and nothing. Dr. M. went up to the house as he was overheated sitting watching me and need water and a rest. I was drenched, worn out, and defeated.

As usual with RingFind customers, I never take their word as to where something is, especially after 50 years!   I rested a bit, drank some water and climbed further up the hill where he said it wouldn’t have been.  Some signals, but then an erratic signal with lots of Iron tone, but also mid 20’s – 30’s VDI, and using PinPoint Mode, I could tell it was about 10″ wide or so and indicated at more than the depth scale deep.  Hmm, so worth digging anyway.

Digging down about 2′, dripping sweat, I kept finding blobs of rusted Iron, nails and some screws. I thought no way this could be chance that there are so many nails in one area. Pinpointer showing larger target, keep digging.   Now I am expecting in my mind a Ziplock clear bag or something, and I had already found an old leather sandal about a foot deep, but I hit another Black Vinyl Strap, kind of like a purse!  I carefullu dug, and sure enough, a purse type material appeared. I tried to pry it side to side to loosen it, but no budge, and I tore the top a little. Drenched, tired as  heck, I plunged my fingers into the hole in it and BINGO! Pulled out 4 Silver Dimes in mint condition!  I almost colapsed from fatigue and joy that I had found it!   50 Years had buried more soil down the hill and originally it was 1 Foot deep, now 2.5′ Deep!

I went up and told Dr. M. and he was overjoyed! Could not believe I found it, let alone where!   I drank more water, then went back down to dig more, and his 97 Year old friend rolled me down a 5Gallon Bucket. I thought I won’t really need it, I will just dig out this purse. Wrong…
Turns out, what he then remembered when he saw it, that it was a Bowling Bag, and he had purchased cloth bank bags full of Silver Dimes and Silver Quarters, mostly early 60’s, mostly Rosies, and some Merc’s, and Quarters from same eras.  I could not get this thing to budge, as I was digging, not knowing how much was there, so I was laying on my stomach, reaching 2-1/2′ down into this bag pulling out handfulls of shiny Silver coins for an hour! The coins were in pristine condition, and the original bank bags were deteriorated, but still pieces showed SanFrancisco Bank on them.

In the end, I wrestled this half full 5 Gallon bucket up to his garage and we weighed it. Over 53 Pounds of Silver!  Accounting for some dirt, say 50 Lbs. We did the math on Silver Melt, and well, you get the idea…

After 3 uncessfull Ring Find calls over the past few months that were real long-shots, I am overjoyed to have found this for him!  I almost lost hope!

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Lost Keys at Park in Orange County CA – Found in stream!

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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I received a call today from Neda at about 1:00PM from the Bay Area asking if I could help her friend Pasha find his Mercedes Key. I asked where he lost it and she explained he was visiting family here in Yorba Linda and was running yesterday at Yorba Park, when he crossed a stream on the rocks, slipped and bashed his knee on the rocks in the stream!  He got up, a little shaken, but continued on around his run and stopped a few times at benches along the way to rest. As he headed back the his new Mercedes in the lot, he felt his pocket and was sure his keys were there, however, he only had his earbuds, and not his FOB!  After re-tracing his steps untill 11PM last night, could not find the key and FOB.
He returned this morning with his mother, and they searched in the water, along his path and every bench he stopped at with no luck. He had to have his new Mercedes towed to the local dealer the night before and was facing an expensive and lenghty process to get a new key and have it programmed for his car.

He was very lucky Neda had researched lost keys and found the TheRingFinders.com and me!

I arrived there at 1:30PM and met Pasha and his mother there, both very nice people, and as we walked across the park trials to the spot where he crossed the stream and he explained what happened. It was now very hot in the park and took about 10-15 minutes to get to the spot.
I brought my Equinox 800 and a couple spare FOB’s of my own just to get an idea of the signal I might expect to see.

I scanned in the water a minute, used my pinpointer to find a signal in the mud but was junk. I swung over to where he had hit his knee and got a similar jumpy signal and then used my pinpointer and immediatly saw the FOB under water in the leaves and mud. I pulled it up in my hand without him seeing it and asked him if it was going to be a big inconvenience to lose it and he explained how much they cost and trouble he already went through, and I handed him his key!  He and his mother were overjoyed!  It took just maybe 5 minutes to find it, and they had searched that same rock by hand several times and didn’t find it.  This was a big relief to Pasha who now could go and pick up his car without more expense of getting a new key made!

It makes my day to return things, and I am happy I could help Pasha and Neda (and Mom) with this return.

 

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Lost Ring in Back Yard Lemon Heights Orange County

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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“The one that got away, 4 years later the story ends!”

As a RingFinder, we have those calls that you remember well, and some of them stand out because you just couldn’t find the item through your best efforts and it leaves you wondering….
I went out on a Lost Ring call back in 2017 in a very exclusive neighborhood in Lemon Heights, CA, at a beautiful hilltop estate!  The wife contacted me and told me she had lost her wedding ring and was very eloquent about her day and detailed as to what she did and where she went. Two search areas, one inside the family room containing several very thick fur rugs, and the backyard areas.  How hard could it be?
I searched the rugs and around the room using my pin pointer because the detector was picking up every piece of rebar and screw in the wood over concrete floor. No luck.
Going into the backyard was like walking into a part of Disneyland! This place was several acres of landscape, hardscape and pool. She remembered picking up the dog’s poo, so that is always fun to search plastic bags of…  and she played with dog throwing the ball into the pool and it could have come off then?  I searched several hours, every planter, plant, grotto, bush, potted plant, inside the pool, on top of the rock overhangs over the pool area, walkways, steps, you name it. I used three different detectors, my AT-MAX, PinPointer and my PI Machine.  Never found it.
Today, I got a call from her, as she remembered me telling her to call if she ever found it. Well turns out she found it exactly one year later in 2018, but could never find my number because she lost my business card, though I am on TheRingFinders.com she neglected to check there.
Today she found my card, and called.
She found the ring in a filing cabinet one year later, underneath the folders in the bottom of the drawer!  She now remembers that day was very hectic and she had taken off the ring while filing and it must have gotten knocked into the drawer and between the folders!
This was a very expensive ring!  She had waited until 6 months afterwards and filed their only homeowners claim for it, got paid and she had purchased a new ring.  After finding it, she was so filled with regret at filing the claim that she called the insurance company and explained what happened, and ended up having to pay them back in full, lol  She now has two rings, and with calling me as promised, almost 4 years ago now, a clear conscience on doing the right thing, her journey of the ring is complete.  I am so glad to hear that it was not missed by me in my searching and that she was reunited with it.

The one that got away has been found….

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Lost Ring in sand at Newport Beach by visiting couple

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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Sunday night, I hit the beach about 4:30 and decided to just do Dry Sand hunting. After finding a Silver then Gold ring in an hour, I figured I would head back to the car. A lifeguard pulls up and asks if I found any rings and I said yes!  He pointed several hundred yards back on the beach by the boardwalk to a couple that he said the woman had lost her ring and borrowed their “loaner” detector with no success.

He had told them about TheRingFinders.com, and I told him I was a RingFinder and would go to see if I could help.
Suzie and Dan explained she had lost her special Arthritis ring in the Volleyball Court and had tried but could not find it.
I said I would search, so I took my NOX800 with 15″ Coil and started gridding….  After about an hour with no luck, they were packing up and so I gave them my business card, and he said he would call to see if I found it. They left and I decided to shift into Beach2 Mode and grid the other direction to see if I may have missed it in Beach1 Mode.

After another 20 Minutes I had a strange signal, and since was digging everything that beeped, scooped up her ring!  Very strange signal for 14K, and Beach1 Mode was even sketchier. I think due to the shape of it?

They texted me the next morning, as they were heading to the airport back to Nevada, and I sent them a photo of the ring!  They called and were very happy to know I had it safe and sound, and would contact me that night when they were home to give me information on shipping it back to them.

After finding Silver and Gold that afternoon in a short period, I was glad I could help reunite them with their ring and I learned about a new type of ring for Arthritis hands (never seen one like it before), and a bit more about my detector as well.

All in all, a great day!

Ring as found.

Ring after cleaning up

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Right place, right time!

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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I had just finished my time detecting at Newport Beach, and was heading back to the car and still swinging in the dry sand, when two young ladies approached me and asked if my detector could find Silver? I said it sure can, and then Kiley proceeded to tell me that she had lost her Silver ring that her Grandmother had given her, earlier in the day and if I could help her find it.

I asked her to show me the area, and she seemed to know about where it was, but I said that there were no towel marks or indication that they had been sitting there and she said she lost it earlier in the day. I figured it was probably still there, as I had not seen anyone else detecting the dry sand, and there were so many people there earlier, I doubt anyone had found it yet. I said I am a member of TheRingFinders.com and do this stuff a lot, and her and her friend had no idea a web site for this existed.

I asked her to walk a rectangle where she thought it would be and I started gridding it…. After about 5 minutes, I found a ring! I took it over to her and her friends and she said that was not it, and they had found that one earlier when they were searching with their hands! Why did they throw it back? She said it was OK and didn’t want me to spend too much time, it was probably just lost, and I said I would keep searching. They seemed ready to leave, so I told her if she gave me her number, I would text her if I found it and she did.

I went back to the area and finished the rectangle, with no luck, so I started going around the outside of the rectangle, expanding it to see if maybe it was just outside that area. After two enlarging passes around the outside, bingo, I found a silver ring with waves on it. I called Kiley and asked her what the ring looked like (she had never told me) and she said it had waves on it. I said “I have your ring in my hand!” She was thrilled and said “I am right behind you, we haven’t left yet!” and she came over to claim her ring.

Since I found nothing else tonight at the beach, I was glad to have returned her ring to her, and went home happy too.

Happy Customer!

Her Grandmother’s Ring

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“Grandma’s Silver”

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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At 2:00PM I received a call from Kaylynn with an unusual request. Her grandmother, whom never trusted banks, had given her (8) Index Card Boxes of Silver coins, and asked her to have her grandson bury them in their backyard in case of Apocalypse!
Her grandson was young at the time, but he and his brother did as requested. Years went by and they did not remember where they were located, and grandma had passed several years ago. Two years prior, the purchased a metal detector to try and find it but with no luck, as they really didn’t know how to use it and thought it was about 3′ down.
Today, her kids had spent the day digging up a 20′ x 15′ area of the backyard where they thought it would be, and made the boundaries wide enough they should find it.  The whole day went by, they dug 2-3 feet down and still nothing. They will be selling the house soon, so needed to find it before then.
They decided to call TheRingFinders, and my friend and fellow RingFinder, Ron Wilton, was not available, so they called me.
I went out to their house and within 15 Minutes, I had a large object signal with my NOX 800, and I told them it may be something else, or may be the box, but it was fairly good sized.
Bingo!  They dug down about 10″ and there it was, just about a foot and a half outside of their boundary line!
All in all, (8) Index Card Boxes full of mostly Silver Quarters, neatly rolled up, and a box of oddball Silver Half’s dating from 30’s to 70’s and various other coins. I would say about 105 Rolls of Silver Quarters, which is 4,200 Silver Quarters with  a melt value today of $2.5589 = $10,747 in Silver!

 

They were so happy to have found it and wished they had called  sooner to save all that digging!
So glad I could help them recover their Silver.

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“It’s in the hole”

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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I received an email today from James, who had lost his Gold ring in his garden, and wanted to know if I could help find it. I replied “Sure, I will call you later this afternoon”, but didn’t hear back so I figured he was busy. I emailed again letting him know the phone# he gave din’t work, but still no reply during the day, so I figured I would just stop by his house after work, as it was 6 Minutes away!

I pulled up just seconds after he got home, and introduced myself, but I noticed a Gold ring on his hand and so I figured he had found it, but he said it was his spare! lol  He has several!

He showed me where he was repairing a PVC Drain pipe and water line, about a foot and a half down, and figured he lost it in the surrounding area, wood chips and bushes.

I got my AT-MAX with small coil and began scanning around the area, jacuzzi, bushes and then poked the coil down into the hole around the PVC pipe and got a signal. Not a clean 50’s but almost like a quarter signal on edge. I popped out my pinpointer and there was surely something metal in the mud a few inches down, and since it was clean dirt and PVC pipe, I had to dig it.

Sure enough, there it was, caked with dirt, but nice and shiny! Super nice guy and happy to have his “primary” ring back.

James was very happy that his wife had found me on TheRingFinders.com.

 

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Something Fishy!

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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Tom called and said he had lost his ring in his Koi fish pond while putting in a bubbler system for the fish.
He noted that his ring was loose, just prior to going in the water, and thought “I Better be careful and not lose it.”
After putting in the bubbler system, that evening he went to take it off and put it on his dresser as usual, and noticed it was gone.
Visually searching the pond, which was fairly clear and just had 1″ gravel on the bottom, but could not see it. He called me and we set up a time to meet. Upon arrival, we went to the pond and he offered waders, but I wore my shorts and water sandals in prep. He said it was really cold, and I said not to worry, I am used to the beach.
It was deeper that I thought, about 2′ and Coooollllddd as heck!
I pretended it was not that cold, and began searching with my AT-MAX. Tom watched a minute then went over to roll up the hose, and I heard him shout “I Found it!”.
He forgot that he had hosed off the patio after finishing in the pond, and it must have slipped off then, and it was just under a chair on the patio. I was happy he found it, but happier to get out of that freezing water. lol
Though I did not find it with my detector, he said if I had not come out there, he would not have looked over there and I thought that a gardener, or someone else may have found it instead. Such a nice guy, and he told me the story of why the ring meant so much to him, and I felt glad I had a part in finding the ring, even though my detector didn’t find it, but my presence did.

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“Ease his Pain” Widower’s ring returned.

  • from Orange (California, United States)
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I got a call yesterday evening from Bill, who was at his wife’s grave site in the evening, and lost his wedding ring somewhere in the grass. She had passed just two months ago.
Bill enlisted some of the groundskeepers to help him search in the grass around the grave markers in the area and along the curb to see if they could find his Gold band, but as it got dark, no luck. He found me on the theringfinders.com and called for help. I made arrangements to meet him there on Saturday morning, and he and I pulled up at the same time. A groundskeeper drove up and told Bill he had searched again this morning, but no luck. Bill led me to her grave site, and showed me exactly where he was walking, where he washed his hands, and where he tripped in a hole. Very detailed in re-tracing his route, which I liked.
I powered up my new AT-MAX with 5×8 coil and got to work. A lot of brass, iron, pipes etc. in a grave site that you would not think about, so I turned the sensitivity way down since I knew it was a surface item. After 15 minutes, I had a hard 57 signal, and of course, it was the ring, about two plots away from his wife.
He was moved almost to tears saying “You don’t know how much this means” and said he thought it was lost forever and did not want to get another ring, because she had the “match to it”. I was also a bit moved by that comment, but was so happy I could help return it, ease his pain and anxiety about losing it, and to be a part of his story. My condolences to Bill and his family.

 

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