PHOENIX — It had been many years since Jeff Gerlach last thought about the class ring his family bought him after graduating from Catalina High School.
He assumed the precious gift had been lost forever after it was possibly stolen from his grandparents' home in the late 1980s.
But then Gerlach got a Facebook message from a stranger claiming to have found the ring at a thrift shop. He wasn't sure what to make of the news, at first thinking it may have been a scam.
"I thought it was crazy," the Phoenix resident said.
But after exchanging some more messages, he realized the ring's descriptions were very similar to the one he once owned. And there was just something about the stranger's messages that seemed genuine.
"I felt he was being sincere," Gerlach said.
That stranger was 27-year-old Jose Islas, who said he found the ring recently while strolling through a new shop in Tucson that opened next to his barber. He bought the ring on a whim and decided to do some research based on the clues imprinted on the piece of jewelry.
Islas knew the ring must have belonged to someone named "Jeffrey" who graduated from Catalina High in 1982. The ring also had the letters "JRG," indicating those may be the owner's initials.
Islas found a website where he could inspect Catalina's yearbook from 1982 and, after a couple of hours of searching, he found a student with the initials matching the ring's letters. He now had a full name and proceeded to sleuth around on social media until he came across Gerlach's profile.
Islas wrote Gerlach a message and waited for a response.
"I just kept thinking to myself 'I hope he doesn't think I'm a scammer,'" Islas recalled in a message to 12News.
After realizing the ring found by Islas was most likely his, Gerlach made a plan to meet up with the Tucson resident. He was coming down to the Old Pueblo to attend the University of Arizona football game on Saturday, so he arranged to meet Islas at a local Starbucks.
The ring was exchanged and it still fit Gerlach perfectly after all these years. And furthermore, he was moved that a young man went to such efforts to reunite him with his lost possession.
"I was really touched by the sentiment," Gerlach said.
Islas said finding the ring's rightful owner was simply the correct thing to do.
"At the end of the day, the memories are all you leave and what better memories to leave than kind ones," Islas stated.
To show his gratitude, Gerlach said he gifted Islas a reward, which Islas tried to refuse and give back. He decided that he'll likely end up donating it.
