Mechanic Discovers Ford Worker’s Lost Wallet in SUV After 11 Years
A Remarkable Find Reunites Retired Autoworker with a Piece of His Past
Lake Crystal, MN – August 21, 2025 – In an extraordinary turn of events, a Minnesota mechanic uncovered a wallet lost 11 years ago by a Ford assembly line worker, hidden under the hood of a 2015 Ford Edge. The discovery, made by Chad Volk of LC Car Care in Lake Crystal, Minnesota, has reunited retired Michigan autoworker Richard Guilford with a cherished item from his past, complete with $15 in cash, a driver’s license, a Ford Motor Company ID, $250 in Cabela’s gift cards, and expired lottery tickets.
The story began around Christmas 2014 at the Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, where Guilford, then a Ford employee, was working on electrical issues in a batch of Ford Edge vehicles. Uncharacteristically wearing sweatpants that day, Guilford had placed his tri-fold leather wallet in his shirt pocket. While leaning over a vehicle, the wallet slipped out and fell into the engine bay, lodging between the transmission and the air filter box. Despite searching 30 to 40 vehicles with the help of coworkers, Guilford, now 56 and retired, gave up hope, assuming it was lost on the floor of a Ford Flex or another vehicle among the 2,000 on the assembly line. “I can’t take too much time to look for this because I gotta work. I’m on the clock,” Guilford recalled. “No luck. Life went on.”
Fast forward to June 2025, when Volk was repairing the cooling system of a 2015 Ford Edge with 151,000 miles on it. While replacing the cooling fans, Volk removed the airbox and noticed it wouldn’t snap back into place. Upon closer inspection, he found the wallet sitting on a ledge above the transmission. “Crazy,” Volk said. “I pulled the wallet out and that’s what it was.” Inside, he discovered Guilford’s Ford ID, driver’s license, and other items, remarkably intact despite enduring years of heat, snow, and rain across multiple states, from Michigan to Arizona and finally Minnesota.
Determined to return the wallet to its owner, Volk used the Ford ID to track down Guilford on Facebook, sending a message after midnight: “Did you lose your wallet years ago? If so, it was in the engine bay of a car.” Guilford, nicknamed “Big Red” at Ford for his red-tinged beard, was stunned. “I would have never, ever, figured in a million years that would still be there,” he told Volk during a video chat days later. Volk mailed the wallet to Guilford’s home in Petersburg, Michigan, where he confirmed the $15 cash was undamaged and the $250 Cabela’s gift cards, intended for Christmas gifts for his children in 2014, were still valid after verification with the retailer.
“It restores your faith in humanity that people will say, ‘Hey, you lost this, I found this, I’m going to get it back to you,’” Guilford said, expressing gratitude for Volk’s honesty. The wallet, a Christmas gift from his sons, has become a family treasure, and Cabela’s agreed to issue new gift cards so Guilford could preserve the original as a keepsake.
The 2015 Ford Edge, built at the now-closed Oakville Assembly plant in Canada, had traveled over 150,000 miles before landing in Volk’s shop, making the wallet’s survival all the more remarkable. This heartwarming reunion underscores the unexpected ways the past can resurface, connecting two strangers through a shared moment of kindness and a vehicle that carried a hidden secret for over a decade.
Sources: ABCNews.go.com, FoxNews.com, APNews.com, FordAuthority.com