California couple makes pit stop at an Arkansas park — and leaves with a huge diamond

When Noreen Wredberg saw she wasn’t too far away from a state park known for its diamonds, she knew she and her husband needed to stop. It paid off big time.

Wredberg and her husband Michael of Granite Bay, California, have spent a lot of time traveling and exploring national parks across the country during their retirement.

They were on a trip to Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas last week when she realized they were near the country’s only diamond mine that’s open to the public.

“I first saw the park featured on a TV show several years ago,” she told Arkansas State Parks in a news release. “When I realized we weren’t too far away, I knew we had to come!”

The couple made a last-minute stop at Crater of Diamonds State Park and started exploring. About 40 minutes later, Wredberg found a sparkling stone on the ground and handed it to her husband.

It ended up being a 4.38-carat yellow diamond, the largest diamond found at Crater of Diamonds so far this year, park officials said.

“When I first saw this diamond under the microscope, I thought, ‘Wow, what a beautiful shape and color,’” Park Superintendent Caleb Howell said in the news release. “Mrs. Wredberg’s diamond weighs more than four carats and is about the size of a jellybean, with a pear shape and a lemonade yellow color.”

The couple was shocked they found a diamond. They said they weren’t expecting to find anything, especially not a diamond so large.

Park visitors often have better luck finding a diamond after a good rain, rangers said. More than an inch of rain fell at the park days before Wredberg’s discovery.

“She was in just the right place to see her diamond sparkle in the morning sunlight,” Howell said.

Wredberg said she didn’t know what she would do with her newly discovered diamond, but she named it Lucy after her husband’s cat.

More than 250 diamonds have been registered at the state park in 2021. About two diamonds are found each day.

The first diamond was unearthed at Crater of Diamonds in 1906. Since then, more than 75,000 diamonds have been discovered.

The largest diamond ever discovered in the U.S. was found at the park in 1934 and weighed 40.23 carats, park officials said.

Last October, a visitor found a 4.49-carat yellow diamond at the park. On Labor Day 2020, a tourist from Arkansas found a 9.07-carat diamond, which was the second-largest ever found at the park, according to state officials.

This story was originally published September 30, 2021 at 2:14 PM with the headline "California couple makes pit stop at an Arkansas park — and leaves with a huge diamond."