SENDING OUR ARTIFACTS INTO THE FUTURE.

Queens cache
The New York World’s Fair site in Flushing Meadows Park has already featured a few times in this blog. Of course, it’s home to the magnificent Unisphere (1964/65): https://wp.me/p7LiLW-3D
And on that same site was the Trylon and Perisphere (1939), another favorite icon of mine: https://wp.me/p7LiLW-2fK

Perhaps less well known is the presence of two time capsules, one from each of the two World’s Fairs, which are 50 feet (15.2 meters) below a circular slab. The 1965 capsule is shown above.

Photograph by Gary Dunaier.

This location was once at the center of the 1939 and 1964/65 Westinghouse Pavilions. The capsules will (hopefully) be opened in 6939, five thousand years after the first New York World’s Fair. Below, the 1938 Capsule is about to be lowered into the shaft, and a diagram of the site (with some considerable exaggeration of the scale of the capsule and shaft).

The objects inside the metal capsules (which were intended to give an idea of American life) are preserved in inert gas. A record of the contents was sent to museums and libraries around the world. This replica of Time Capsule 1 is in the Heinz History Center, in Pittsburgh.

Visitors to the 1964/65 Fair could sign a guest book which was photographed onto microfilm and placed inside the capsule.

Shorter term
Harold Davisson did not create his time capsule collection for a future civilization, but for his grandchildren, so they could see first-hand all the things that were part of his life in 1975. However, he lived until 1999 (when he was 91), so he was able to describe the contents to them in person. The date set for the capsule to be opened is 2025. 

Harold included 5,000 assorted items including a car (a Chevrolet Vega). He wanted to get his time capsule into the Guinness Book of World Records as the world’s largest, and he achieved that in 1977, but then an argument began. The Crypt of Civilization in Atlanta (which was sealed in 1940) is larger, although Davisson felt that as it’s a sealed room, it is not the equivalent of a buried time capsule. By the way, the Atlanta chamber (shown below) will not be opened until 8113.

So to make sure of being the largest, Harold built a second capsule in 1983, above the first, underneath a concrete pyramid. He put another (well-used) car in this one, along with other assorted things.

Future car
In 1957, a new gold and white Plymouth Belvedere, with various items inside it, was placed in a vault in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Residents of the city guessed what the population would be in 2007, and the idea was that after the vault was opened, the winner would get the Belvedere.

Unfortunately, the vault had flooded over the years and ruined the car. But Tulsa has another time capsule car, a Plymouth Prowler, which was put into an above-ground vault in 1998. That one will be opened in 2048.