"Class" ring

[Pona]

I see on this from time to time on here and I'm sorry to say I have no idea what a "class" ring is. Is it a ring they give to school leavers in their final year or do every year have one? do all schools do this? If so, does every person get one or are they just given to "top performers"?
Do many people wear them?

Sorry for all the questions, I'll go back to my comfy red velvet arm chair now and finish smoking my pipe.

[giant056]

The most common class rings are the High school ones, but you can find college rings as well. Basically the ring usually has the owners initials engraved on the inside is why so many of them can be returned to the original owner. I've got several that I never did find the owners and a couple of them I really can't identify the school they're from because they're so worn out you can't tell. The people that were going to the school in question had to request the ring and pay for it, they would give you a selection of different styles to choose from. When Class rings first became popular people would go to a jeweler and have one custom made because at the time none of jewelry makers had a class ring selection that you could order from. In the U.S. the two most popular ones when I went to high school were "Jostens" and "Terryberry"

[Pona]

Thanks for the info Giant, I would imagine being able to return something so important back to the person/family who lost it must be superb. Class rings are not something that has caught on in the UK, sad really. Even if the ring is not worn it is a nice memory/momento from your school years.
I think the only keep sake I have from school is the Chalk board rubber that Mr Huffer the Physics teacher used to throw at us when we were too busy talking about football instead of one of many Newtons laws. :D
I can remember as if it was yesterday, walking out of the lab with it in my pocket on last day of school, thinking "He'll never throw that at another kid"

[lee]

last year mate i found a 1921 class ring from Hartford high school , i couldn't see the point in tracing the guys name on the inside of the ring coz if he graduated in 1921 at 16yrs that would of made him like 106 ? or there about.
ahhh the old school rubber.........hit me on the head many times, thrown by mr carrol another physics teacher.
p.e teachers.....now they where brutal.........training shoe across the back of the hand , bloody hell that used to hurt.
anyone else got any stories of psycho teachers ?.

[Pona]

Ah P.E. Teachers, We had an American P.E Teacher for a while, I think he was on some sort of gap year thingy?? His name was Mr Grechen/Grekin??? something like that iirc. I do remember him trying to teach us how to play Basketball...it was chaos! It ended up looking like the fight scene at the start of Gladiator :D I kept getting told off for "travelling"...pfft!

Nice to hear from ya as well Lee, ow ya bin owd cocka?

[Tom]

last year mate i found a 1921 class ring from Hartford high school , i couldn't see the point in tracing the guys name on the inside of the ring coz if he graduated in 1921 at 16yrs that would of made him like 106 ? or there about.

Not judging, but, someone from his family, children, grandchildren etc. might have looked at it differently. Class rings are about the only item of jewelery that someone might have a good chance of being able to return. Would be and is good PR for our hobby! One might be better off to just melt it down and keep it to oneself rather than to say it was found and did not want to bother to try to return. Makes us all look bad.......I'm just saying.

[lee]

Ah P.E. Teachers, We had an American P.E Teacher for a while, I think he was on some sort of gap year thingy?? His name was Mr Grechen/Grekin??? something like that iirc. I do remember him trying to teach us how to play Basketball...it was chaos! It ended up looking like the fight scene at the start of Gladiator :D I kept getting told off for "travelling"...pfft!

Nice to hear from ya as well Lee, ow ya bin owd cocka?

yer mukka my copper field was good to us this year , turned up 7 and a half coppers for me plus indian head penny's and a nice 1675 silver Spanish cob for me mate chris , i was appy for him all tho he is a septic tank......its nice to see the colonies doing well aint it.....lmao

[lee]

Not judging, but, someone from his family, children, grandchildren etc. might have looked at it differently. Class rings are about the only item of jewelery that someone might have a good chance of being able to return. Would be and is good PR for our hobby! One might be better off to just melt it down and keep it to oneself rather than to say it was found and did not want to bother to try to return. Makes us all look bad.......I'm just saying.

yes you are judging and that's fine , i had two initials on the inside of the ring and that was it , so to trace his family from that would of been bloody hard,
and where did you get i melted it down from ?????? huh ? for your information it has a place of honour in the front of my finds case and will never be melted down..........................im just saying

[Skamaniac]

I think the only keep sake I have from school is the Chalk board rubber that Mr Huffer the Physics teacher used to throw at us when we were too busy talking about football instead of one of many Newtons laws.

My 7th grade teacher was a crack shot with those! He could arc it over 5 rows of heads and pop the head he wanted in the back of the room. Ah, the good ol' days!

[Tom]

yes you are judging and that's fine , i had two initials on the inside of the ring and that was it , so to trace his family from that would of been bloody hard,
and where did you get i melted it down from ?????? huh ? for your information it has a place of honour in the front of my finds case and will never be melted down..........................im just saying

The two initials on the ring along with the year and school name along with the ring size can be cross referenced against records pretty accurately to try to find the original owner or family of. Especially from way back in 1921 when class sizes were so small the odds of anyone sharing the same initials were probably slim to none, so yes, I am just saying, that if you never tried how could you know? But honestly I could care less about what you do with the ring, my point was just, actions like that make the entire metal detecting community look badly when someone says whats the point in trying to return it. All the while trying to justify why one can't instead of maybe why one could. So I stand by my opinion of if you want to just keep it why brag about it?

And I never said you did melt it down I only suggested you might have been better off doing that and never mentioning you found it without trying to return it.

[Pona]

My 7th grade teacher was a crack shot with those! He could arc it over 5 rows of heads and pop the head he wanted in the back of the room. Ah, the good ol' days!

lol Skamaniac, you make it sound like some kind of sport...it probably was back in the day! Teachers these days seem to lack the throwing skills of their predecessors. Its yet another example of man kind becoming lazier in their changing surroundings