Ring Melt Connects Graduates with USMA Class of 2024

Grip hands tho' it be from the shadows... Since 2001, the West Point Association of Graduates’ Class Ring Memorial Program (CRMP) has been symbolically echoing this passage from “The Corps,” by incorporating rings worn by members of the Long Gray Line into the new rings being made; thereby allowing each graduating class a tangible way of "gripping hands" with previous graduates. During the annual Ring Melt, graduates’ donated class rings are  ceremoniously placed into a crucible, melted to form a single gold bar, and this gold is gifted to the Second Class to be used in the making of their class rings. Through this process, the figurative aspects of “grip hands” become literal, imbuing each new West Point class ring with all the strength, wisdom, and principles of the “Corps of an earlier day.” Their legacy lives thanks to the Class Ring Memorial Program. Read more.