HALLOWAY, Nebraska — Halloway Lanes has closed lanes 7 and 8 after coins, jewelry and other small personal items began arriving through their shared ball return. Owner Beth Rusk said the objects do not belong to the machine or current bowlers, and several have been identified as property lost years ago. The alley's remaining 10 lanes are open.
The first item appeared during a Tuesday senior league match. Retired mechanic Dale Winn picked up his ball and found a brass bus token in the return tray. He recognized the former Omaha transit design but assumed someone had placed it there as a joke. No player claimed it, and Rusk put it behind the counter with ordinary lost property.
A child's red coat button arrived on the next cycle, followed by a bent silver earring. League member Karen Lott identified the earring as one she had lost at a wedding reception in Lincoln in 1999. She brought the matching earring from home Thursday. Both pieces share the same repair mark on the clasp, according to Rusk, who returned the item after photographing it.
The return uses a covered belt to lift balls from an underground track and a rubber wheel to place them in the rack. Smaller items usually fall beneath the lane into a service gutter, maintenance contractor Luis Brenner said. A coin might be carried up by chance, but the wheel and guides would likely bend or discard an earring before it reached the bowlers.
Brenner dismantled the exposed portion of the return Wednesday and vacuumed the track from the pin deck to the seating area. He found lane oil, dust and two modern pennies. The next league bowler received a green plastic whistle after her first frame. Rusk said the whistle was dry and did not show fresh scuffs from the machinery.
By Friday, 14 objects had appeared. They included a house key, a military shirt button, three foreign coins, a charm shaped like a pear and a grocery-store loyalty card discontinued in 2008. Most remain unclaimed. Rusk has posted photographs without serial numbers or identifying scratches and asks claimants to describe those details before taking an item.
The unusual returns have slowed league play and brought spectators who reserve a lane hoping to recover something. Rusk canceled those reservations and asked customers not to feed objects into the equipment. She said the alley will not charge admission to view the tray or promise that anyone's property will be found. Halloway police took an informational report but are not investigating a theft.
Two claimed objects have ordinary histories. Winn's wife identified the bus token from a jar the family kept until a move in 2011, though neither remembers where it went. A school counselor recognized the pear charm as part of a bracelet lost beside a public pool when she was 12. Family photographs show the charm, but not clearly enough to confirm the small dent she described on its reverse.
Brenner switched off the return Friday afternoon, unplugged its motor and blocked the underground track at the pin deck. At 6:42 p.m., a black plastic comb slid into the tray without a ball behind it. The comb was warm and held three long gray hairs. No one in the seating area claimed it, and the service channel was empty when opened.
Rusk placed the comb in a paper envelope and locked the return cover. On Saturday morning, a woman from Holdrege called after seeing its photograph and correctly described a missing tooth near the handle. She said it had belonged to her mother, who died in 2017, and had been left in the pocket of the dress in which she was buried. Rusk has asked the woman to meet at the alley before deciding whether to release it.