Sacramento Car Buyers Find 50-Year-Old Wedding Ring; Trying To Find Owner

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) - A Sacramento couple bought a used car and found a wedding ring lodged between the seats.

It all started when the Callahans lost their cellphone three weeks ago. They started digging through their car, and that's when they came across a 50-year-old gold wedding band.

When Shannon Callahan pulled the 14-karat wedding band with diamond chips out from underneath her car seat, she wondered if her husband might have some sort of secret.

"Well, my first thought was 'Where'd this ring come from?" she admits.

But what was written inside, answered some of her questions: a date from 1961.

"It symbolizes their life together," she says.

In the three weeks since, Shannon's been trying to track down the person with the finger it belongs on. But it hasn't been easy.

"We're going back to 1961 for a marriage so they could be 50, 60, 70 years old," she says.

The Callahans bought the 2004 Pontiac Grand Am in January at a Sacramento used car lot. Using the car's VIN, Shannon found out there was only one previous owner. The car was registered in El Paso, Texas and had been in a bad crash years ago.

"The car was pieced together," she says. "It was definitely in some kind of accident."

Shannon doesn't know if that's when the ring got lodged in the front seat. But she realizes there is a chance the owner isn't around anymore, either from the accident or old age.

"If not, hopefully there's children or grandchildren," she says. "Only someone close will know the date inside the ring."

Family members who may not even know the ring is missing even after all these years, but Shannon is intent on returning it to the rightful owner.

"My wedding ring means the world to me," she says. "That's what marriage is all about. We just want whoever owns it to have it back."

The Callahans have also tried to find the previous owners by going through the Texas DMV, but privacy laws are keeping them from getting any names.