The Lost Ejector

Last September I used my C&R to buy an M1 Garand from the CMP. It arrived only three weeks later. The serial number indicates that it's a May 1945 build and all of the parts and drawing numbers are correct for the date of manufacture, the stock has no rebuild cartouche, i.e. it appears to be completely original and never "armoried" or rebuilt.

So when I received it I of course immediately stripped it down. Good thing, too, because there was a layer of hardened Cosmoline a half-inch thick under the handguard. I cleaned it down to the bolt. I have an M1A with a nearly identical bolt so I have a little experience (I know, it's a dangerous thing!) with these bolts. So I used the combo-tool to disassemble the bolt. Some of you may know that the extractor, ejector and firing pin are held together by an exceedingly cunning design, compliments of Mr. Garand. Well, despite my best efforts, the ejector spring and the ejector shot out of their hole so fast ...

I found the spring, only because I heard it hit the wall, ceiling, floor. A lot of compression on that spring! But the ejector was GONE. I moved all of the furniture, I vacuumed the LR and DR, I spent two days looking for that thing. It was gone and I was just crushed.

I ordered two replacements online, and in a few days I test fired it at Clark Brothers. Needs to have the front sight adjusted, that's all, and completely my fault because I disassembled it, but it was caked with hard Cosmoline, and what's a mother to do?

Last night when I was adjusting the blinds in the DR I noticed something that didn't belong. There was a tiny thing caught between two of the "matchsticks" in the matchstick blinds. The ejector had been propelled there by some substantial force, believe me. It had been caught there for eight months. And here it is:
Welcome home!