If you follow college football at all — or own a TV, computer or a smartphone — you probably didn’t miss that quarterback Johnny Manziel led the Texas A&M Aggies to a 52-48 comeback against Duke in the New Year’s Eve Chick-fil-A Bowl.
But the Texas A&M culture goes far beyond football. Another A&M trend is the class ring. Alumni cherish class rings — Aggie rings — they can purchase for graduation. The rings’ long history dates back to 1889 when the oldest known Aggie ring was made 13 years after the college opened its doors.
So how do the treasured Aggie rings and wastewater fit together? An Aggie ring recently turned up at the Carter’s Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in College Station, Texas, where A&M is located. The shocking part? The ring was lost two and a half years ago.
The 9.5 mgd facility serves a population of nearly 100,000 — 60 percent of which is Texas A&M students.
In an article on TheEagle.com, Water Services Technician Ron Waters says he was washing out a 40- by- 60-foot debris slab at the treatment plant when the shiny piece of jewelry caught his eye.
“The stuff on the slab is not supposed to shine,” Waters says in the article.
The ring belonged to a 2011 Texas A&M graduate who received the ring as a graduation gift from her grandfather. She lost the ring two weeks before graduation when it fell into an automatically flushing toilet, says the article.
Waters was able to hunt down the ring’s owner using the Texas A&M Association of Former Students online network that includes a Lost and Found page for rings.
What is the most bizarre item you’ve discovered at your treatment facility?
