There are few actresses more universally beloved than Betty White, who passed away in on December 31, 2021, at the age of 99. During her near century of life, the television star accomplished a great deal: White won five Primetime Emmy Awards, two Daytime Emmy Awards, was inducted in the Television Hall of Fame, was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, was honored with the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, and was even named an honorary forest ranger by the USDA Forest Service, one of her lifelong dreams. She had an incredibly accomplished professional life, but her personal life, which she kept largely to herself, was equally as fulfilling.

Over the course of her life, White was married three times. First, she married Air Force pilot Dick Barker in 1945, but the union lasted less than a year. In 1947, the Golden Girls actress wed talent agent Lane Allen, but the pair split in 1949 because she didn't want to stop focusing on her booming career to have children. Then, in 1961, White met her match: Allen Ludden. After appearing on his show Password, White and Allen hit it off. "We felt like we knew each other," she told the Archive of American Television. Though there was an instant connection, Ludden was attached to someone else at that point, and White turned him down for over a year.

Ludden continued to court White, presenting her with a diamond ring that she wore on a chain until she was ready to accept his proposal. "I spent a whole year, wasted a whole year that Allen and I could have had together, saying, 'No, I wouldn't marry him. No, I won't. No, I won't leave California. No, I won't move to New York,'" White told Oprah in 2015. "I wasted a whole year we could have had together."

Unfortunately, the two were together for just 18 years before Ludden passed away from stomach cancer in 1981. White famously never married again, noting to Anderson Cooper in a 2011 interview that she already "had the love of my life. If you've had the best, who needs the rest?" 

So, what did White do with her diamond-encrusted wedding ring from Ludden? As far as we can tell, she kept (and even continued to wear!) the bauble after Ludden's death. After her own passing, the ring—as well as Ludden's wedding ring—sold at auction. According to National Jeweler, White's wedding ring was made of twisted white and yellow gold and featured 1.15 carats of round diamonds in the center. Ludden's ring features the same twisted gold detail, just without the diamond center. Unlike White's rings, Ludden's was inscribed with their wedding date and the words "I really do."

White's wedding ring sold for a whopping $25,600, which far exceeded the estimate of $800 to $1,200. Ludden's fetched $12,800. Though we don't know who owns White's ring, it's certainly with someone very lucky.