We are all familiar with the centuries-old idiom describing something that is impossible to find: “It’s like searching for a needle in a haystack.”
Well, Robert and Janet Cockwill of Arrowwood, Alta., just southeast of Calgary, have a much more modern version for that old saying — “It’s like finding an engagement ring in a carrot patch.”
This is truly one of those Ripley’s Believe It or Not tales about an engagement ring that went missing about 50 years ago and then it was found. That’s amazing in its own right. But where it was found really ices the cake for this story.
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The story starts in 1969 when Robert, who was running the family mixed farm near the hamlet of Arrowwood, asked Janet to be his bride. He took a cash advance from the Canadian Wheat Board and used half of it, $425, to buy her an engagement ring. They were married in June 1970.
Robert was born and raised on the family farm. He was attending the University of Calgary when his dad died suddenly. Robert left school at the age of 19 to take over the family farm in 1965.
A few years after they were married — sometime in the early ’70s — the engagement ring went missing. Janet had a habit of taking the rings off and putting them in the same place near the sink when she was doing dishes. One of the leading thoughts was that the ring got knocked into the sink and ended up in the septic tank. Or the ring may have somehow got knocked to the floor and ended up in a heat vent.
“Bob had taken out a grain advance to buy that ring, so he wasn’t too pleased when he found out I lost it,” laughed Janet.
“At least he didn’t show me the door.”
“I just had that sick feeling you get when you lose something that’s important to you,” she says.
“I turned the house upside down and searched from top to bottom but the ring was nowhere to be found.”
A few years passed and eventually Robert bought her a new engagement ring.
So that was the 1970s, and many things have happened since then. The Cockwills had three little kids by 1975. They were living in an old house on the farm when they got married. Janet says “it was old” and then they moved. They built a new house in 1982 and tore the old house down.
For many years, they had a garden plot on the east side of the house. But then that area got contaminated with some “bad” compost, and just a couple years ago they created a new garden spot on the west side of the house. Their older grandson Blaine has rototilled the plot each year.
The garden was seeded and growing a usual mix of vegetables this year.
“And then this fall our grandson Nolan and his partner, Morgan, who also live in the yard were cooking something and they raided the garden for carrots,” says Janet.
“And to their surprise one of the carrots had a ring wrapped around it. “
“Nolan came rushing into our house with a funny look on his face and a real grin,” says Robert.
“In his hand was the ring. He knew what he had found.”
“I couldn’t believe it,” says Janet. “I just couldn’t believe it.”
“He came in the house and showed me what he had in his hand, and I was six feet away, but I knew immediately it was the engagement ring I had lost nearly 50 years earlier. I went up to him and said, ‘I’m not going to cry, but I’m going to give you a really big hug.’ He’s not a hugger, but he said it was okay.”
“The more you think about it, the more you realize all the complex logistics involved for that ring to be found,” adds Janet.
“A lot of things had to line up for that carrot seed to be planted so it grew up through that ring. It is just hard to comprehend.”
Over the years, the Cockwills had changed houses, a couple years ago they switched garden spots. The plot where the ring was found is rototilled, so the ring had to be relatively close to the surface of the soil. It had to be positioned in such a way, so that the carrot grew up through the middle of the ring. And then it was one of the carrots that actually got harvested (not thinned out during the growing season) and ended up on Nolan and Morgan’s kitchen counter.
“We have no idea how it got into that part of the yard,” says Janet. “And yet there it was.”
She took the found ring to the local jewellery store in nearby Vulcan. The owner sent it away for cleaning, and it came back looking good as new.
Janet says since her ring was found, they’ve heard of a few other miraculous stories of rings being recovered. One person, for example, must have lost their wedding ring in the yard and by some miracle it was found in the crop of a chicken when the bird was butchered.
Janet says she is just thrilled to have her original engagement ring back and on her finger, but the circumstances of how it got to that part of the yard will always remain a mystery.
Bob was pragmatic.
“With that kind of unbelievable luck, I think this is obviously a good time to buy a lottery ticket,” he says.
