A silver U.S. Army ring missing for two decades is finally back with the soldier who once wore it, fulfilling a promise a Fort Worth woman made three years ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd I\u2019ll keep looking till I find him,\u201d Mary Thelen told NBC 5 Responds in 2023.<\/p>\n
Thelen was searching for the owner of a ring she discovered tucked inside an old footlocker belonging to her son, Douglas, who served four tours in Iraq.<\/p>\n
Douglas did not remember exactly where he had found it. He thought it might have been overseas –perhaps in a truck or somewhere in the sand near Baghdad.<\/p>\n
But the ring offered several clues about its owner:Texas, four aces, the nickname \u201cT-Bone\u201d and, most importantly, a name engraved on it: Terry Sheppard Jr.<\/p>\n
When NBC 5 first shared Thelen\u2019s story in February 2023, it attracted plenty of attention. Online sleuths began contacting a man by that name.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a lot of people messaging me on Facebook, just randomly,\u201d Sheppard recalled. \u201cOne of my coworkers told me about a story they\u2019d seen, and they were like, \u2018You think that\u2019s yours?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
For a time, it appeared the mystery had been solved. But Sheppard and Thelen never connected, and the ring remained in her care.<\/p>\n
Still, Thelen kept it safe — and kept searching.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can see that this ring belongs to a person who really wants it back, and I really want to meet him,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Then, during the summer of 2026, Sheppard reached out to NBC 5 seeking help recovering his ring.<\/p>\n
A few weeks later, he and Thelen met face-to-face.<\/p>\n
\u201cSee if you remember that,\u201d Thelen said as she handed him the ring.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, my goodness,\u201d Sheppard replied. \u201cI haven\u2019t seen this in forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
Forever was not much of an exaggeration. Sheppard said he had not seen the ring since 2006.<\/p>\n
He ordered it after completing basic training. The design was a personal snapshot of the young soldier he was at the time, featuring his name, his Texas roots and his nickname, \u201cT-Bone.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m glad it\u2019s back where it belongs,\u201d Thelen told him.<\/p>\n
The reunion solved one mystery — but uncovered another.<\/p>\n
Sheppard never deployed to Iraq, meaning Douglas could not have found the ring there. In fact, Sheppard said he wore it only once or twice.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe last place I can remember having my ring would be Fort Bragg, North Carolina, 82nd Airborne Unit,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
It turns out Douglas was also stationed at Fort Bragg during that period. Both men worked in the same area. Sheppard believes he may have removed the ring while working. Douglas likely found it and forgot about it — until his mother uncovered it many years later.<\/p>\n
Whether Terry and Douglas ever crossed paths remains unknown. <\/p>\n
\u201cI just never thought I\u2019d actually see this again,\u201d Sheppard said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A silver U.S. Army ring missing for two decades is finally back with the soldier who once wore…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":443715,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[116,118,117,24054,153250],"class_list":["post-443714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth-headlines","tag-fort-worth-news","tag-nbc-5-responds","tag-responds"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=443714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/443715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=443714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=443714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=443714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}