North Dakota Vet Gets Nice Surprise On Antiques Roadshow (video)

I ran across this story from about a year ago and I don't know how I missed it before. Antiques Roadshow did a show in Bonanzaville which is in West Fargo, North Dakota just across the Minnesota/North Dakota border. It's a place that is made up of old structures and machinery from the late 1800's - early 1900's. A very fitting place for Antiques Roadshow to show up.

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It's great to see a veteran bestowed with such good fortune. This veteran served in Thailand during the Viet Nam war. He served in the Air Force and was stationed in Thailand for a couple of years in the early 70's.

This man had no easy deployment. His job was in disabling explosives, clearing landmines, etc. Not a job for the faint hearted.

When he was stationed in Thailand, he noticed that a lot of the pilots wore a certain Rolex watch. A Rolex Oyster, to be exact. He thought it was a pretty cool watch, so he bought one for the bargain price of around $345. If you know anything about Rolex watches, you know that they now run, at least, around 10K.

For some reason, this guy never took it out of the box, keep all the papers and never even filled out the warranty. He put it in a safety deposit box and took it out a year ago to bring it to this episode of Antique Roadshow.

Peter Planes, of Antique Roadshow, appraised this gem of the watch and had some very good news for this veteran. He took very good care of this watch for years and now this watch was going to take care of him.

Peter Planes explained to the veteran that this watch was very valuable. In fact, it would probably bring around $400,000 at auction. When the guy heard this, he fell over. Peter Planes told him to get up because he had more news for him.

Because this veteran had never worn the watch and kept it locked up in a safety deposit box with all the papers and documentation, including a warranty that he never filled out. Planes told him this Rolex Oyster watch would bring as much as $700,000. Wow!

Watch this video and I promise you that you'll be as happy for this guy as I was. Couldn't happen to a more deserving guy!