A meteorologist in the US Navy was pleasantly astonished to retrieve a wallet he had lost 53 years ago in Antarctica. Paul Grisham, 91, did not even remember missing the wallet when friendly strangers reached out to him to return it via mail.
The unexpected finding was made during the 2014 demolition of the scientific base on Ross Island, where Grisham had been assigned as a weather forecaster from October 1967 to November 1968.
The sailor’s wallet was stored behind a locker and contained, among other things: his Navy identity card, his driver’s license, a reference card for what to do in case of a biological or chemical weapons attack, and a ration card for beer. Grisham said he was “blown away” that so many people had gone to great extents to return the wallet to him. It took a long line of Good Samaritans to return the wallet to him.
The head of a research group in Antarctica contacted one of his former employees, who earlier had famously reunited a Navy ID bracelet, found for sale in a store, with its legitimate owner. Along with his daughter, they appealed to a foundation for veterans, who in turn contacted the Naval Weather Service Association, of which Grisham had been a member. The wallet finally arrived last Saturday in excellent condition at Grisham’s home in San Carlos, northern California.
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