From lost to found: a wallet resurfaces in a car engine after 150,000 miles

A retired Michigan worker has been reunited with his wallet—lost in 2014—after it turned up intact in the engine compartment of a car with more than 150,000 miles on the odometer. Richard Guilford received an unexpected Facebook message that revived a memory he had long forgotten.

The leather wallet, which still held $15 in cash, his driver’s license, work ID, $275 in gift cards, and several lottery tickets, was discovered in June by mechanic Chad Volk at a body shop in Lake Crystal, Minnesota. It had been wedged between the transmission and the air filter housing of a 2015 Ford Edge. “It’s crazy,” Volk said, still stunned by the find.

‘It restores your faith in humanity’

Guilford—nicknamed Big Red at the Ford plant where he worked—was equally astonished. “It restores your faith in humanity, when people say, ‘Hey, you lost this, I found it, and I’m going to give it back to you,’” he said. The discovery came during a routine repair, when a misfit in the air filter led Volk to adjust the part and uncover the wallet—miraculously preserved after eleven years of travel, rain, snow, and extreme heat.

The retired worker still remembers how it happened. In December 2014, while inspecting newly manufactured cars at a Michigan plant, he felt the wallet slip from his pocket. He and his colleagues searched through 30 or 40 vehicles but found nothing. “I had no luck. Life went on,” he recalled.

Now, after its return, his family treats the wallet as a true keepsake. Guilford, who retired in 2024 after nearly 35 years at Ford, marvels at the odds: “Think about this—11 years, through rain and snow in Minnesota, and before that in Arizona, with the heat from a transmission on the highway. It’s incredible.”

Even Ford has taken notice of the story. “A repair that hit the nail on the head. Can you imagine the odds?” said company spokesperson Said Deep. Cabela’s, meanwhile, confirmed that the gift cards inside remain valid and offered to renew them.

As for Guilford, the wallet won’t be used again. “I’m going to put everything back inside and keep it just as it is. It’ll stay in the display case at home for my children. One day, they’ll tell the story to my great-grandchildren. We’re storytellers. That’s who I am.”

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