Lost college ring is found in a cave off coast of Africa

SOUTH EUCLID, Ohio (AP) -- A college ring lost more than 20 years ago by a former undercover officer for the CIA has been found in an underwater cave off the coast of Africa.
Steve Ruic, a writer on staff at Notre Dame College in this Cleveland suburb, received an e-mail about two weeks ago from a professional diver from Germany. Wilfried Thiesen wrote that he had found a class ring bearing the college's name while diving on Mauritius Island. Mauritius is off the coast of South Africa, east of Madagascar.
The ring, which has a blue stone, was engraved with the year '76, but part of its shank was "ruptured and torn out," Thiesen wrote. The ring was missing the portion that ordinarily carries its owner's name.
Ruic publicized the discovery in both an e-mail to staff of the Roman Catholic, liberal-arts college and an electronic newsletter to alumni, but no one came forward to claim the ring.
Ring's owner
It's owner was revealed a short time later. While interviewing a member of the class of 1976 for an unrelated alumni magazine story, Ruic asked Dr. Maryellen Amato Stratmann of Springfield, Mo., if she'd ever been to Mauritius.
"She said, 'No, but Clare Cavoli Lopez has,'" Ruic says.
Lopez, a 1976 Notre Dame College graduate and former CIA undercover officer, was stationed at Port Louis, Mauritius, from 1983 to 1985.
"I enjoyed water sports," said Lopez, now a consultant in Woodbridge, Va., who serves on the advisory board of Notre Dame's intelligence research and analysis degree program. And, she remembers "foolishly wearing my beautiful Notre Dame ring" during a dive in the Indian Ocean in which it slipped off her finger.
"I was so upset," said Lopez, who grew up in Cleveland.
Contacting Thiesen
Ruic sent Thiesen's address to Lopez. She wrote Thiesen but has only received an automatic e-mail response that he was out of his office in Kirchheim, Germany. She wants to connect with the diver to arrange her ring's return.
Lopez replaced her lost class ring but wants to try to repair the original.
"It will be wonderful to decide which one to wear," she said.