Naval Academy graduate and retired Marine Corps fighter pilot David Lorenzo served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, wearing his Naval Academy ring throughout many combat missions, but upon returning home he lost the beloved ring while golfing with his father in Pennsylvania.
Lorenzo joked to the Pensacola News Journal,
It survived combat, but it couldn't survive my golf game.
The ring remained buried at the Uniontown Country Club near Pittsburg until Michael Zenert saw something shiny sticking out of the clay near the fourth hole.
Zenert said,
I saw this shiny thing and I thought it was a beer can tab. I dug it out so no one would step on it and I saw it was a ring.
He cleaned off the ring and saw that it was a Naval Academy class ring from 1964, with Lorenzo's name engraved inside.
The Pennsylvania man recently traveled to Pensacola, Florida, so that he could personally return the ring to the veteran who currently volunteers at the National Naval Aviation Museum at Naval Air Station Pensacola.
Lorenzo, now 82 years old, was grateful to be reunited with the ring that he had lost more than half a century ago, saying,
I never thought I would see it again. It was very sad when I lost it, and this means a lot.
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