NEW YORKERS help me out: Do you have a great tale of losing something in NYC and somehow actually getting it back? we're doing a "lost and found" guide for New Yorkers — would love your stories!! reply here or DM me, and thanks 😎
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Maybe not technically what you’re looking for, but here’s a bit of the story:
I was back in France, and I hadn’t been able to reach my partner in NYC for more than 12 hours (and counting), and it was his birthday.
I kept checking my phone and got an email at 5am from an unknown person
1/2
saying “M gave me your email address, he’s at the hospital”
No more info, not even the hospital’s name!
So I called one in his neighborhood, they eventually redirected me and I found him! He had left his phone home, and only remembered my email address and told the ambulance who remembered once home
Lost my backpack. It had my business cards inside and the guy who found it called me and gave it back, nothing missing, not even my computer. Gave him all the cash in my wallet cause I was eternally grateful
Circa early 00's, I had my wallet drop somewhere on a subway car and somehow it made it all the way to the Lost and Found of a MTA station with all contents intact and no fraud alerts on my cards
Yo Yo Ma took a New York cab, putting his Stradivarius cello in the cab's trunk. Arriving at his hotel, he stepped out, leaving the cello in the trunk of the cab. On realizing what he had done, he contacted police, who located the cab and the cello.
Had my bike stolen from my building in Bushwick, and 3 years later found it locked up while walking the dog. Immediately went to get bolt cutters and stole it back.
one time i left my wallet on a bench on the upper east side & someone called me to give it back. all the cash was gone and I had already canceled all my credit cards, but it was still really nice of them! they got my number from the vet card for my cat, which had her old name of "Skinny Dumpling" 🤣
Last year, the well-loved bodega cat on the corner disappeared. Months later, a regular customer saw the cat's picture on a shelter website (ACC?) -- she showed the picture to the family, who rushed over to the shelter to bring her home. Everyone is overjoyed (and curious about her adventures!).
Left my phone on the M34. Combined Find My iPhone and the MTA bus tracker to figure out which bus it was on. It ended up going to the bus terminal two blocks from where my wife was working so she picked it up.
I do! My action camera fell off my bike on the Brooklyn Bridge while I was commuting to work (I used it for safety because Bike NYC!) and a good samaritan found it while it was still recording, traced back my ride and left it on the stoop of my building.
When I was a PA for indie films, I dropped my iPhone in the street in Chinatown at the start of an overnight shoot. "Well that's gone forever" I thought. The next day I went and replaced it, & once I set up my emails and such I had multiple messages saying "contact this person, they have your phone"
A woman had found it and wanted to return it. She said her daughter had lost her phone a week before so they knew how upsetting it could be. (I couldn't help thinking I may have considered it the universe balancing itself out) She actually brought it to me at work while I was on set.
I lost a wallet with $25 in cash in it on a BK bus and when I asked the driver the next day if he'd had someone turn it in he said no but check out the main lost and found, "You might be surprised."
I did and wallet had been returned less a $5 reward fee.
My daughter's favorite stuffed animal (beau -beau) fell out of the stroller as we were carrying it down the 28th st NR station. when we came back to the same station 3 hours later, someone had picked him up and put him against a chain link fence at the top of the stairs. He got a bath that night.
I had my jacket stolen on a date to Rocky Horror in Chelsea by a random guy who wouldn't stop hitting on me. Later that night a drunk friend saw him wearing it at a party and stole from him. She called me the next day to ask why my science notes were in her new jacket
Was visiting when I found a cell phone in the back of a cab in the W. Village, took a call from the owner, who was far, far away and said I would wait for them at a small Italian bar/cafe. By the time they arrived everyone at the bar knew the story and cheered and toasted them when they walked in.
Many years ago, I left my ancient flip phone in a cab. Next passenger gave it to the driver, who opened it up found the contact labeled Dad and called my dad who called me. Met the cabbie a few hours later to get my phone. I think I gave him $20.
I lost my wallet in Grand Central which is how I learned there is a Grand Central lost and found, they run a very tight ship and I got my wallet back with everything in it
I’ve lost so many phones in NYC and never found a one of them. But I’ve returned multiple phones and wallets to their owners. And I dropped a glove in Times Square on NYE in 1999 and then found it again on the way back to the train
At one point, my wife and I were going to the airport, accidentally left our suitcases in the taxi due to a miscommunication, and for me reasons, I had remembered the taxi number.
We got our suitcases back, though not in time for my sister's wedding, which meant we went shopping.
my late cat Nico peed in her carrier on the way back from the vet so I was flustered & dropped my vintage Spider-man wallet. I had my own biz card in it so I got a call late from someone describing themselves as having short platinum hair to meet at the Wash Sq hotel bar. So
I get to the hotel & talk to the doorman (no smartphone) who said "Oh you'll know when you see him". I go straight back and... my wallet had been found by fashion designer/drag nightlife icon Richie Rich! I did recognize him. He said he liked my vintage spider-man wallet https://richerettebyrichierich.com/
Twice I’ve lost my wallet and twice a New Yorker had the presence of mind to let me know they left it at a local public place: a bar and the central library. No need to interact face to face! In the case of the bar, a bartender called me so the Good Samaritan didn’t have to get involved at all
Does repeatedly "losing" my car to whatever branch of parking enforcement was towing that day count? Pre-internet. Worst: Many phone calls to learn that I would have to get from Brooklyn to Staten Island to pay a US Marshall in order to retrieve my car from the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Without a car.
Literally Friday, my mom left her purse on a street and didn't realize until she got home that it was gone. She then received a message on LinkedIn from a young woman who had found it and looked her up. The woman wouldn't even accept a token reward: my mom got it back with everything intact.
My 1st year law school dorm was literally next door to the Hells Angel’s HQ. One day during the summer while up on the laundry room balcony my friend dropped her blackberry onto their roof. The clubhouse was so sweet & they retrieved it for her immediately.
got in a gnarly bike accident, another cyclist stopped to help, traded me his city ID and took my bike back to his apartment after the EMTs absconded with me. Got in touch with him & traded back a few weeks later, once I'd healed up a bit.
It's not a "great" story, but I once left my Moleskine notebook in a yellow cab. The next person in the cab looked in it, thought I'd really like it back, and called my number on the inside of the notebook. I picked it up from them at their office and gave them a Starbucks gift card as a reward
In about 2000, someone called me on my home number to tell me that they had found my flip phone. They figured out how to call me by opening it and hitting the button labeled, "home".
When I arrived at the 47th Street YMCA, he gave me back my phone and refused my offer of $100 as a reward.
circa 1998 I lost my cell phone in a taxi cab and the driver found it and called my dad because he was listed in my phone as Dad! I was 25 and he lived in TN though so it was pretty funny that he got the call. I got the phone back obvi
The delivery guy from my pharmacy either lost or tossed my meds on the side of the road in Brooklyn and a week later it turned up in the mail - someone had stumbled across it and mailed it to me.
When I moved to Brooklyn from Minnesota, I left my wallet in a cab when I’d lived there for like a week. True despair. A day or two later, a guy is at my door with a FedEx envelope. And I think … no way. He hands it to me. It’s my wallet. (1/2)
In 2007 I was living in DC and went to an anti-war march. I dropped my wallet, and it was picked up by marchers from Ohio. They saw the address on my Ohio license and called my dad (phone books were great!) He met the bus of protestors, got my wallet, and mailed it back to me.
Another tip if you find a wallet: if it has a bank card, call the bank, read the card number, and ask them to get in touch with the owner of the card. They can relay your contact info so the person can meet you and pick it up! Once did that when a customer accidentally left their card.
Driver wrote a note saying he saw my Minnesota license and figured I’d moved recently — but something in there had my Brooklyn address too. So he FedEx’d it to me.
Always felt very bad I foolishly lost the envelope without getting enough info from it to pay him back. So a few years later, living in DC, I saw a phone lying on the ground. Picked it up, tried to get in touch with the owner, eventually took out to the Verizon store so they could get it to him.
lost my phone on the subway after midnight on NYE after rapidly leaving the car when someone puked - tl;dr someone picked it up, and when my sister tried to call me the next morning to say happy new year they answered! I was able to go on an adventure to get back it from them. And they charged it!
Years ago, when I had only lived here a few weeks, I dropped my keys with my card case attached on the platform while hurrying to get on the L and didn’t notice. As the doors were closing, some guy fastballed them into the car with me.
It was at night, too, and I was still really unfamiliar with navigating the city and wouldn’t have had anywhere to go if I couldn’t have gotten into my apartment! No cards and no keys. A real angel.
I had jury duty, got home and found my keys missing. I called the courthouse, and told them about the keychains on my keys, they told me to call back in 20 min so they could look. When I called back, they told me they'd found them, and the staffer who'd found them was ECSTATIC about it.
now a bit embarrassed bc I misremembered - they connected me to the lost and found, and as I described my keys the guy cut me off and started describing them for me, since he'd found them in their pile of lost keys. still ecstatic though 😊
I lost my wallet while on a break from my office job. Had to replace everything in it, which was a huge pain in the ass. Found it wedged into my office chair a month later.
My wallet fell out in a cab in the mid 1990s. The next guy in the cab found it and when he got home, called the credit card company and got my mom’s info (we shared the card) and she gave him my NYC contact info. So I took the train from Astoria to the UWS and got it back. I couldn’t believe it.
This was around 2008 or so. I lived on Clinton Street in Cobble Hill. As was my personal fashion of the time, or wore a ridiculous clump of keys on my waist, secured by a silver chain and brass "lobster-claw" clip.
I'd gone to a show at Zebulon in Williamsburg, and returned early in the AM, a bit drunk, quite smitten, and very tired. I lazily clipped my keys to my bag instead of my person, and as it happens, didn't notice that they'd become detached when I collapsed into my seat.
I took the B61(62?) back down to Atlantic, and walked a few blocks to my place before realizing I couldn't get in.
Knowing that the bus made a loop in Red Hook, I rushed back to the stop opposite where I had disembarked, and waited for the next bus.
I figured I might have missed my bus, and worst case scenario I'd be sitting at the stop awkwardly explaining my situation to every driver working that route.
Instead. A bus approached 10 minutes later, and swerved over into the pickup lane with an intentionality verging on frightening.
A motorcycle I own was stolen off my street in Harlem in broad daylight. It had an AirTag hidden inside. Using my other motorcycle (I really like motorcycles), I chased the AirTag around Upper Manhattan & The Bronx for two hours before finding the bike abandoned on a side street.
Friends helped me get the stolen bike back to Harlem, for which I was very grateful. But what touched my heart most was meeting an elderly neighbor I didn't know the next day. He showed me his phone log and told me he'd witnessed the theft and was on the phone with 911 as it was happening.
The BEST part: he got so frustrated waiting for the cops that he said he considered confronting the thieves and scaring them off by telling them he had a GUN in his fanny pack.
Holding back laughter (and a few tears), I responded: I AM SO GLAD YOU DID NOT.
My kid was sitting on the end seat of the subway. A rider's purse snagged her headphones, that and phone pulled off and fell in the gap on the tracks. She went to the booth to see how to get them; on the way back a guy with long wire was fishing for them. She yelled at him until he gave them back
I lost my phone on my walk home. The battery died sometime between when I lost it and when I realized. It had just enough juice for the lady who found it to call one of my contacts and give them her number. I used my roommates phone to call her. She brought it over after trick-or-treating.
I lost my Florida driver license not long after moving to the city. About five years later, it showed up at my parents' house in Florida in a plain envelope. I figure some 16-year-old who looked enough like me found it and used it for the intervening years.
Pre Uber dominance I left my guitar in the trunk of a yellow cab on my way, late, to a bartending shift in Park Slope. It is/was my most prized material possession. I had no cab number and I’d gotten dropped off a couple blocks away from where I worked so the cabbie didn’t even know where I was.
I was basically in tears behind the bar (and drunk) a couple hours later when he walked in with the guitar. He’d gone into like 3 other bars already looking for me. I hugged him really hard and gave him all the money in my tip jar.
My favorite story of a lost-and-found phone is when I dropped my phone onto the A train tracks, and I figured it was gone forever. After work, I got off the train and it was still there, between the rails. To my surprise, the booth operator called someone to get it for me. I ❤️ NYC
Not my personal tale but when my car broke down on a roadtrip in Illinois, the mechanic who looked at it said he loved NYC because the one time he'd been there, he'd left his camera (back when those weren't phones!) on the subway and panicked. Someone saw and gestured and mouthed "next stop!!" --
-- through the window. They expected him to just get on the next train and then off at the next stop, but he sprinted all the way because he didn't know how frequently trains came. They were waiting there to hand it to him.
I’m on the other side of it. I found a bag in front of my house with a substantial amount of money, I think $1,400. It was a bank bag, and the bills were crisp, new $100s. I figured it was somebody’s rent. I posted on my local mom’s FB group, asking the owner to tell me how much money was in the bag
My wallet fell out of my pocket on the street somewhere. Spent a couple of hours frantically retracing steps and checking trash cans before giving up. Went home to discover the wallet with a note sitting on my doormat. Kindly tourists had found it and somehow got into my bldg and returned it!
After we got engaged, my wife was bringing home a new dress to wear to our engagement party and left it on the subway by mistake.
She called the mta lost and found, and they were actually holding it for her.
Got it back same day.
I left my journal, no lock, full of extremely personal thoughts somewhere in Grand Central Station. Weeks later I got a call from Posman Books: they had it in a drawer and handed it to me without so much as a smirk or knowing smile. I had never felt such relief and gratitude before!
Back in early 2001 I was working as an intern at a hospital in the Bronx. My hospital-issued beeper fell off and was lost in the snowy streets. As a poor intern, I was distraught because I couldn't replace it. Some kind person found it, responded to my beeps and returned it, no reward necessary!
in my senior year of high school i left my phone on the bus on my way to school and someone brought it up to the bus driver, who took it to the Port Authority lost and found and my mom and i went over there and got it back!
i have another one from more recently, i was walking around the jay st/downtown area and one of my earrings fell out and i didn’t realize until i was like 4 blocks away and i RAN back and someone had picked it up and put it on a little stoop so it didn’t get kicked into the gutter
Lost my phone on the MetroNorth when stepping off at Harlem, and got it back an hour later after convincing the lost+found people to make an extra trip to the lost+found box
As I stepped off the Hudson line at Harlem sometime around noon, I could hear my earbuds disconnecting from my phone that I left on the seat. Ran downstairs and bought a ticket to Grand Central with the next train.
he lady in the information desk was very nice and pointed me to the platform where my train had arrived, where the trains stood, doors closed but a conductor was still there. He allowed me to have a quick look through but I had to guess at which car I sat in...
so I just very keenly peered at any seat that reminded me of the one I sat in, with no luck. The conductor then told me that they put lost items in a big metal bunker-like box, so I went over there.
I had my laptop and was able to connect to the phone via "find my phone", that should make the phone ring loudly-- so standing beside the box, I listened intently and certainly imagined hearing it. The GPS location was just a big circle around Grand Central,
so my next stop was the lost+found office tucked away downstairs, where two gentlemen told me they open the boxes at 11am and I was welcome tomorrow to see if they found it (!) However, showing them the "find-my-phone" GPS location encouraged them a bit,
A counter example - the only place ppl seem to get annoyed at acts of kindness is out in the country. I found a car/house key on a tiny dirt road; spent 1/2 hour asking ppl along road; drove into city to get a store to give me guy's phone number from shopper's card; & he's offended bc I call him 1/2
GF dropped her wallet as we were getting into a cab to the airport. Missed the flight, catch another one with her passport, and were gone for a week. Come back, she checks her gram, one of my neighbors had found it on the street, tossed it on top of the amazon locker in my lobby, and messaged her
My phone fell out of my pocket as friends and I were running to catch a cab for dinner. I realize I don't have it and use my friend's phone to call it. A truck driver answers and says he picked it up on the street. He told me he'd leave it with the guys at Joe's Pizza on Carmine.
Stayed in the cab after dropping my friends off and sure enough the guys at Joe's Pizza had my phone. Got back in the same cab and made it back in time for dinner.
A couple of years ago, I dropped my wallet in the middle of Prospect Park, without noticing.
Someone found it and handed it to a nearby police officer, who looked inside it for my phone number and called me. I was able to go pick it up from him about 45 mins after initially losing it.
I left a Kindle in a taxi once and some guy mailed it back to me! He opened it and he found my name. I had a land line at the time and was listed. Since I don’t have a land line anymore, could never happen again but it was very cool and I was so happily surprised!
Right after I got my first job and moved into my first apartment, I lost my wallet over the Christmas holiday. I gloomily canceled all my credit cards and went to work the next day.
I went into work the next day and got a call the next day f4om a guy who found the wallet on the way home from Midnight Mass and called the number on my brand new business card.
A friend of mine lost her headphones but had an AirTag on them, so we went to the address the AirTag indicated. No one answered, so we left a note, and they showed up in the mail a week later. I also had a roommate who lost her wallet, and whoever found it mailed it without taking anything!)
oh rachel i have another one- once on a field trip i threw out my retainer with my lunch and my teacher mrs simon went through the trash dumpster with me to find it 😭
my parents white 86 ford escort station wagon was stolen from our driveway in queens and the one thing that made it unique was it had a 26+6=1 irish unification bumper sticker, which is how the police found the guy driving it a few miles away.
2013 - in NYC with friends. Both we and they were pregnant, and sightseeing in Times Square one night. Caught an Uber back to Vrbo, but a couple of blocks of stop and go triggered nausea. Wife emptied purse, friend filled it, and we tossed it 2 blocks from the square. 2 blocks later, key missing.
We jumped out (lost key charge was ridiculous!), found the can with the purse (palm frond sticking out?), grabbed a plastic bag from a convenience store, stashed purse and took transit back to rental. Friends beat us back.
Left my phone, with attached wallet on back, on the subway. Got home, used Find My Phone on my computer, and the map showed it was on my block approaching my door. Someone saw I left it, saw the address on my ID, got off the train themselves and walked to my apartment.
Not a New Yorker, but years ago a New Zealand/Aotearoa author, Witi ihimaera iirc, lost a wallet with a substantial amount of cash there. Can't recall exactly where- on a bus maybe? Reported it lost, got a call to say it was handed in, not a cent gone, by a young Puerto Rico woman and her daughter.
Not a New Yorker but I was arrested at the 1 year anniversary march of Occupy Wall Street and the NYPD stole my driver's license!! I lived in Texas at the time, and let me tell you it is *impossible* to get a replacement driver's license in Texas. Finally got a new one in KY with my parent's address
Visiting NYC. Partner's cell phone fell out of his pocket, we didn't realize it & didn't bother getting a taxi receipt. So, no way of IDing the cab, where they'd drop it off, nothing. If you want to know how we got it back during November in Manhattan, I'll be happy to DM.
I somehow left my phone (with a wallet with ny credit card, license, and subway card in it attached to the back) on the subway. Someone turned it in - the only thing they took was the subway card. I laughed real hard.
Not the most dramatic but: Drivers' license fell out of my wallet at the Sunset Park farmer's market, I came back to the same stall next week and they had it for me.
Not really a lost, but more an almost lost story. I worked for a month on a pilot, & was about to fly back to LA after pulling a brutal all nighter. I was rushing to catch my ride to JFK and this woman stopped me to point out that my backpack was open with laptop peakling out.
Never had it happen to me but I remember Dept of Sanitation would occasionally post stories about people accidentally throwing valuable things out in the trash and them managing to track it down
This is the opposite direction but once a girl dropped an iPad while she was getting into a cab and by the next day, I’d found someone she knew on Facebook and her assistant picked up the iPad for her.
i was on the subway in the winter. a friend realized as we were getting off that she left her gloves on the seat. a guy noticed it and yeeted them right through the closing doors. stunningly graceful.
Was doing errands (groceries, library, etc), including dropping off large items at a donation center, carried in a giant blue IKEA bag. After dropoff I stuffed the bag in my backpack. Got home and realized I didn't have the bag anymore. I was bummed because those bags are handy. Would you believe..
In 1994 I left my backpack on the JFK shuttle bus with my passport and plane tickets. Had to wait for the bus to circle around. Got it back and the driver was nice about it. Pre 9/11 so the security issue wasn’t really a problem.
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I was back in France, and I hadn’t been able to reach my partner in NYC for more than 12 hours (and counting), and it was his birthday.
I kept checking my phone and got an email at 5am from an unknown person
1/2
No more info, not even the hospital’s name!
So I called one in his neighborhood, they eventually redirected me and I found him! He had left his phone home, and only remembered my email address and told the ambulance who remembered once home
I lost a wallet with $25 in cash in it on a BK bus and when I asked the driver the next day if he'd had someone turn it in he said no but check out the main lost and found, "You might be surprised."
I did and wallet had been returned less a $5 reward fee.
We got our suitcases back, though not in time for my sister's wedding, which meant we went shopping.
My 1st year law school dorm was literally next door to the Hells Angel’s HQ. One day during the summer while up on the laundry room balcony my friend dropped her blackberry onto their roof. The clubhouse was so sweet & they retrieved it for her immediately.
When I arrived at the 47th Street YMCA, he gave me back my phone and refused my offer of $100 as a reward.
People can be lovely!
Knowing that the bus made a loop in Red Hook, I rushed back to the stop opposite where I had disembarked, and waited for the next bus.
Instead. A bus approached 10 minutes later, and swerved over into the pickup lane with an intentionality verging on frightening.
She smiled and said "I noticed those when you got on, and heard them sliding around the back after you left."
fin
Holding back laughter (and a few tears), I responded: I AM SO GLAD YOU DID NOT.
I love this frickin' city.
I was very happy, but not actually surprised.
She called the mta lost and found, and they were actually holding it for her.
Got it back same day.
He came and grabbed the keys w/out a word of thanks.
Or the dairy farmer who was peeved that I stopped to corral a loose cow & herded it back off the road for him.
Someone found it and handed it to a nearby police officer, who looked inside it for my phone number and called me. I was able to go pick it up from him about 45 mins after initially losing it.
This was in 97 / 98
https://observer.com/2004/08/to-find-citys-heart-lose-your-walleti-did-five-times/