Gold Ring Found 62 Years Later

ANTLE, BROWN, HASTINGS, ODEN, POWERS

Posted By: JCGS Volunteer
Date: 3/21/2014 at 20:11:45

Gold Ring Found 62 Years Later
Former Kellogg Woman Gave Ring to Daughter on Birthday in 1875
KELLOGG – Believe it or not, an 18 carat gold band ring which disappeared 62 years ago was returned to its original owner, Mrs. Belle Oden Hastings of Des Moines last week.
The story goes back to the seventies when Kellogg was young and the business section was a block west of its present location. The Oden family lived in a house where the Newman garage now stands and Mr. Oden operated a drug store here.
July 18, 1875, Mrs. Oden gave her daughter, Belle, a gold band ring for a birthday gift and engraved on the inside were the words “Mother to Belle” and the date. A short time after the ring was placed on a shelf in the Oden home and when Belle went to get it, it was gone. Dilligent search was made but all to no avail.
Some time ago E. M. Antle, who was then street commissioner, purchased a property directly across the street from where the Oden house had stood, and a year ago last spring wrecked the buildings on the place and hauled the lumber to his farm north of town. While smoothing over the lot he raked up something bright and shining, and removing the dirt, he found it to be a gold band ring in good condition with this inscription, clear and plain on the inside “Mother to Belle, July 18, 1875.
He remembered a family by the name of Brown who had a daughter by the name of Belle and this spring when she returned here to pay a visit to some friends he showed her the ring. She said she never possessed such a thing and wondered if it could have belonged to Belle Oden.
The Oden family had been gone from here for years and but few knew where any of them were. This fall Mrs. Hastings visited in the Charles T. Powers home and some friends of Mr. Antle’s heard of her being here and told the Powers’ of the ring. Communication with Mrs. Hastings revealed the story and the ring, fraught with memories of her girlhood days was sent to her last week.
Source: Newton Daily News; Wednesday, November 17, 1937