#25. Where It Began
The story began in February 2019 in Southern Indiana. The Jeffersonville High School was scheduled to be torn down because it was in deplorable shape and it had been empty for years. What was once a vibrant school full of young teenagers transitioning into the rollercoaster of adulthood was now a decrepit pile of bricks waiting to be demolished.
The building was supposed to be empty, as the former faculty removed all valuable objects from the premises back when the school was closed years before the demolition. But apparently, there was something that they missed, and it was the construction workers who discovered what this was.
#24. The Discovery
After the school was torn down, the construction workers were ready to remove all the rubble, dirt, and bricks that had once been a school. Right before he started bulldozing the place, one worker spotted what looked like a bag and decided to take a look. It was then that he discovered a small blue bag that was surprisingly in good shape, considering all the years that had passed and, of course, that it had survived the demolition of the building.
The blue purse also seemed to be full, so the worker couldn’t contain his excitement to see what was inside it, and that’s when he hit the jackpot. At first sight, the contents of the bag looked like garbage, and one might have just thrown it in the trash. But the worker decided to inspect it closely.
#23. What Was Inside?
The worker opened the little blue purse and found a bundle of objects that seemed to be very, very old. He figured the bag had belonged to a student, and he inspected the objects to see if he could figure out how old they actually were. Luckily, there were a few newspapers clipping inside which confirmed the origins of the purse: it was from the 1950s.
The bag was full of retro items that only confirmed the date even more. Among the items was a really old lipstick tube that was intact, which suggested that the purse belonged to a girl. Every single item looked like junk at first glance, but they were in fact pieces of a puzzle that the construction workers started to piece together.
#22. The Owner
Right underneath the lipstick, the worker found a folded sheet of paper, which he carefully folded up. It turned out to be a letter written to someone named Marty by someone named Torchy. Upon reading it, he discovered that it was a love note from two teenagers.
Apparently, Torchy wrote Marty to ask her to go to prom with him and asked her if she was already attending the event with another guy named Paul, who apparently also wanted to take her. The worker couldn’t believe his eyes as he read about this love triangle from almost 70 years ago, and he was determined to find out what finally happened to the three students and who Marty actually went to prom with.
#21. Tracking Her Down
The workers were very invested in the story and everyone had his own theory of what went down with the love triangle. Then, they decided to contact the school board to see if they could find who the students were, and see if they could get in touch with Marty to give her back her purse.
It was actually the news clippings that helped the school board find Marty because of the date. The workers were informed that the bag belonged to Martha Ina Ingham, class of 1955. Now that they knew who Marty was, it was time to find her, return the purse, and hope that she would share her story.
#20. Marty
Luckily, finding Martha wasn’t as difficult as they thought it would be. Turns out that she split her time between Maryland and Florida, and was enjoying her retirement with her family. When she heard about what the workers had found, Martha was speechless but excited to get a hold of her belongings once more.
Turns out that Martha remembered the purse and said she had lost it decades ago and couldn’t believe it had been inside the school this whole time. After confirming that it was hers, she was ready to finally share her story with the workers, who were incredibly invested in the events at this point. They were just dying to know what had really happened!
#19. The Story
Martha – who went by “Marty” back in the day – was extremely popular in high school, and all the boys wanted to take her to prom. Paul and Torchy were her classmates, and they were both madly in love with her, so much so that they both asked her to prom and fought to gain her affection.
Unfortunately for the boys, Martha ended up going to prom with another guy named Carter Williams, which left the two other guys devastated. But things with Carter ended after senior year, and Marty didn’t end up with any of her admirers. Yet, finding the purse brought back memories that had been buried in the back of her head for decades.
#18. Memories
Although she was extremely shocked by the workers’ discovery, Martha was incredibly excited and grateful to have her purse back. However, she said she had no intention to revive any of her old romances and that they would only continue in her memory. Coincidentally, something very similar happened to another woman on the other side of the country.
As she was cleaning up her house, a woman in Georgia named Ann Caldwell made an incredible discovery that had been lost for decades as well, and this time, it brought her back to someone who she hadn’t seen since her high school days.
#17. Spring Cleaning
After living in a really messy house for years, Anna decided it was time to straighten things up and sort out her junk out once and for all. That was when she surprisingly found something that she hadn’t seen in over 60 years. Even though she thought she knew every inch of her home, there had been a drawer she hadn’t opened in decades.
As she looked through the stuff in the drawer, Ann found a sparkly object that caught her eye among all the clutter. “What could it be?” she thought to herself as she reached for the shiny object, and it turned out to be a class ring. However, she had no memory of ever having one, so she took a closer look.
#16. The Ring
Luckily, the class ring wasn’t all bling, and it was engraved with the initials C.S., which obviously didn’t match Ann’s. She inspected the gold and black ring very closely and saw that it also said it was from Weatherford High School, class of 1959. This took her by surprise because she had no idea who it belonged to.
Ann became completely invested in the mystery because she couldn’t figure out how that ring had ended up in her house, let alone who it belonged to. She lived in Georgia, and Weatherford High was all the way in Oklahoma, where none of her family members lived. That’s when she decided to get to the bottom of it.
#15. Finding the Owner
It would be a long shot, but Ann had to try. She needed to know who C.S. was and what his or her ring was doing in her drawer. She did some research and eventually found the Weatherford Superintendent of Schools, Chad Wilson, and asked him for help.
Surprisingly, Wilson became invested in the mystery as well and took it upon himself to solve it. After all, if anyone could solve it, it would be him. As Superintendent, he had access to all the school records from the area, but maybe not even that would be enough to locate the owner.
#14. The Search
Wilson looked everywhere for information about the Weatherford High School class of 1959, and eventually got a hold of a yearbook from that year. He looked through every page trying to find someone with the initials C.S., and as it turns out, only one senior student matched it.
The student’s name was Coy Sullivan, one of the three valedictorians of his class, and there was one photo of him. After his discovery, he contacted Ann right away, but she wasn’t sure she had ever met someone with that name before. With the discovery came another mystery: who was Coy Sullivan, and why was his ring in Ann’s house?
#13. Locating Coy
Given the age of the student, Ann and Wilson weren’t even sure if Coy was still alive, and their investigation hit a brick wall. There was no information about him anywhere, and they were very close to giving up. In fact, Wilson decided to let the case go because it was pointless, and only followed it in his spare time.
Ann was disappointed because she would never know how the ring ended up in her hands and decided to move on. But just after the duo lost all hope, something happened that reopened the case of the mysterious ring, and their hopes got right back up again.
#12. Thanks, Facebook
Of all places he could’ve searched, the Superintendent didn’t think of today’s most trustworthy source of information: the internet. Although Coy would be a senior citizen now (if he were even still alive), so finding him on Facebook would have been unlikely. But do you know who Wilson found? His son.
Justin Sullivan, Coy’s son, had a Facebook profile, and Wilson decided to message him. This was his last chance to solve the mystery, so he and Ann had their fingers crossed. Luckily, Justin answered them, and it seemed as though they could finally get the answers they had longed for months.
#11. The Final Piece
Not only had they found Coy’s son, but it turns out that Coy was alive and well, and just couldn’t be tracked down because he wasn’t a friend of technology. Ann got in touch with Coy and told him her story, and Coy remembered what had happened as if it were yesterday.
The class ring was one of his most treasured possessions, but one day he just couldn’t find it anymore. Coy looked for his precious ring for months, but eventually gave up, and just accepted that he would never see it again. Yet, the ring had been in Georgia in a woman’s drawer for who knows how long, so how did it end up there?
#10. Mystery Solved
Ann was happy that she could give Coy his beloved ring back, and she was also excited to figure out how it ended up with her. The two actually became pen pals and exchanged several letters, and they tried to piece together the mystery. After getting to know each other, they finally figured it out.
As it turns out, it all had to do with Ann’s late husband, who had passed away several years before. His family owned a laundry near Weatherford High School, where students and people from the area took their clothes to wash, and that’s how Coy and Ann were connected.
#9. Finally Reunited
Coy had apparently left his ring in the pocket of one of his clothes and sent them to the laundry, where the ring ended up in Ann’s husband’s hands. And now, Coy was reunited with his ring, and the timing couldn’t have been better, because he had a class reunion coming up.
That small object was extremely important to Coy because it reminded him of everything he had gone through in high school. The power of memories is often underestimated, but in reality, one tiny item can unleash hundreds of memories we have hidden in the back of our brains. And this is exactly what happened to an old couple named Adrian and Vicky.
#8. Their Love Story
Adrian Pearce and Vicky Allen dated for two years while in high school, and the two were madly in love. The two were inseparable and did everything together, until one day, it all came crashing down. Right before the holidays, Vicky decided to end the relationship, which took Adrian off guard.
Since Christmas was coming up and Vicky had already bought Adrian a present, she decided to give it to him as a token for him to remember her by, and they both went their separate ways. But Adrian was so heartbroken, frustrated, and angry, that she never opened the present – until now.
#7. Forgotten
Adrian was so upset after the breakup that he couldn’t bring himself to open Vicky’s present, so he just tossed it under the bed and forgot about it. Years went by and the present remained unopened, as Adrian moved on with his life. He met another girl, named Valerie, who turned out to be the love of his life.
The couple quickly got married and started a family, and Adrian almost completely forgot about Vicky. Yet every Christmas, the memory of the present came back into his mind. However, he never found the strength to open it, until 47 years later.
#6. The Discovery
At this point, everyone in Adrian’s life knew about the mysterious gift, and they all had about enough. His wife convinced him to once and for all open the present, and Adrian got a brilliant idea. He found the present and decided to take a picture and upload it to Facebook.
In his post, he asked his Facebook friends if any of them knew or was still in touch with Vicky, so he could reach out and maybe open it together with her. He thought it would be a good opportunity to reconnect, catch up, and most importantly, get closure.
#5. The Reunion
Luckily, one of Adrian’s high school friends was also friends with Vicky on Facebook and was happy to help the two high school sweethearts reconnect. When Adrian got in touch with Vicky, she was extremely surprised but excited to see him again and open the present together.
Vicky invited Adrian and his wife to see her at her home in British Columbia, where they would finally see what was inside the gift. There was so much pressure built up around this present, that everyone had a theory about what could be inside, and Vicky couldn’t remember what it was at all.
#4. Memories
What Vicky did remember, however, was the situation surrounding the gift. Back then, when she went Christmas shopping, she ran into a guy named Wolf, and after talking for a while, he kissed her. Although she was dating Adrian at the time, Vicky didn’t pull back and kissed him as well.
She felt so guilty afterward that she thought the right thing to do was to break up with Adrian, but still wanted him to have the present. And finally, after 47 years, the couple reunited and was ready to open the present once and for all.
#3. The Big Reveal
The story actually made it to CTV, a Canadian television network, and the couple opened the present in front of the cameras. Vicky did the honors of unwrapping it, and her reaction was priceless. She gasped and muttered that she couldn’t believe she had bought that for Adrian all those years ago.
The present turned out to be a book called Love Is: New Ways to Spot that Certain Feeling, which was a comic strip collection inspired by love letters the writer had written to her own husband. It was super cheesy, but adorable, and Adrian couldn’t help but smile.
#2. Closure
What the couple didn’t reveal was the inscription Vicky had written inside only for Adrian to read. However, Adrian decided to frame the book and the wrapper to treasure it forever, and the couple said their goodbyes.
But the story is far from over. Adrian decided his story was too good to be left untold, so he decided to write a book about it. Thanks to the TV coverage of his experience with Vicky, he was able to promote his book, The 47-Year-Old Present. However, not everyone in his life was excited about his idea. In fact, it was quite the opposite.
#1. Different Opinions
Adrian’s son wasn’t happy about the book at all. The fact that his father was putting all his creativity into a story about his ex-girlfriend and not his mother didn’t sit well with him. Not only that, but Adrian also wanted to take his story to the big screen.
But Vicky wasn’t ok with it and thought it was just too much, so Adrian backed out. Reconnecting and reconciling was nice, but capitalizing on the story would have eventually ruined its magic, and that’s the last thing the former couple wanted. So, which of these stories did you like the most?