Time capsule

History

Early examples

It is widely debated when time capsules were first used, but the concept is fairly simple, and the idea and first use of time capsules could be much older than is currently documented. The term "time capsule" appears to be a relatively recent coinage dating from 1938. In Poland a time capsule dating to 1726 has been found. Around 1761, some dated artifacts were placed inside the hollow copper grasshopper weathervane, itself dating from 1742, atop historic Faneuil Hall in Boston. A time capsule dating to 1777 was discovered within a religious statue in Sotillo de la Ribera. A time capsule was discovered on November 30, 2017, in Burgos, Spain. A wooden statue of Jesus had hidden inside it a document with economic, political and cultural information, written by Joaquín Mínguez, chaplain of the Cathedral of Burgo de Osma in 1777. A time capsule from the era of the American Revolution, dating to 1795 and credited to Samuel Adams and Paul Revere, was temporarily removed in 2014 from the cornerstone of the Massachusetts State House in Boston. It had been previously opened in 1855, and some new items had been added before it was reinstalled. It was ceremonially reopened in January 2015 at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, with specific restrictions on media coverage, to preserve the fragile artifacts. The contents were displayed there briefly, and then reinstalled in their original location. It is the oldest known time capsule in the United States.

20th century

In 1901, a time capsule was placed inside the head of the copper lion ornamenting the Old State House in Boston. It was opened in 2014, during repairs to the sculpture and building, with plans to add new artifacts and reinstall it in its original location.

The Detroit Century Box, a brainchild of Detroit mayor William C. Maybury, was created on December 31, 1900, and scheduled to be opened 100 years later. It was filled with photographs and letters from 56 prominent residents describing life in 1900 and making predictions for the future, and included a letter by Maybury to the mayor of Detroit in 2000. The capsule was opened by city officials on December 31, 2000, in a ceremony presided over by Mayor Dennis Archer.

A time capsule labelled "Kan aabnes i 2012" ("Can open in 2012" in Norwegian) was sealed in 1912 in Otta, Norway. The capsule was opened as part of a ceremony 100 years later in 2012. Despite the large excitement over the capsule's opening and a preceding ceremony, its contents (which included notebooks, newspaper clippings, and community council papers) were met with disappointment.

The Crypt of Civilization (1940) at Oglethorpe University, intended to be opened in 8113, is claimed to be the first "modern" time capsule, although it was not called one at the time. During the socialist period in the USSR, many time capsules were buried with messages to a future communist society.

The 1939 New York World's Fair time capsule was created by Westinghouse as part of their exhibit. It was 90 inches (2.3 metres) long, with an interior diameter of 6.5 inches (17 cm), and weighed 800 pounds (360 kg). Westinghouse named the copper, chromium, and silver alloy "cupaloy", claiming it had the same strength as mild steel. It contained everyday items such as a spool of thread and a doll, a book of record (description of the capsule and its creators), a vial of staple food crop seeds, a microscope, and a 15-minute RKO Pathé Pictures newsreel. Microfilm spools condensed the contents of a Sears Roebuck catalog, dictionary, almanac, and other texts.

The 1939 time capsule was followed in 1965 by a second capsule at the same site, but 10 feet (3.0 m) to the north of the original. Both capsules are buried 50 feet (15 m) below Flushing Meadows Park, site of the Fair. Both the 1939 and 1965 Westinghouse Time Capsules are meant to be opened in 6939.

There is documentation of at least three physical time capsules at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as well as a "virtual" or digital time capsule.

As of 2019, four time capsules are "buried" in space. The two Pioneer Plaques and the two Voyager Golden Records have been attached to spacecraft for the possible benefit of spacefarers in the distant future. A fifth time capsule, the KEO satellite, was scheduled to be launched in 2015–16. However, it has been delayed several times and an actual launch date has not been given. After launch, it will carry individual messages from Earth's inhabitants addressed to earthlings around the year 52,000, when it is due to return to Earth. As of July 2019, the satellite had not been launched.

The International Time Capsule Society was created in 1990 to maintain a global database of all known time capsules. The Not Forgotten Digital Preservation Library maintains a current map and register of domestic and commercial time capsules.

21st century

In 2005, Forbes magazine administered an email time capsule project in which people composed emails to themselves, and Forbes promised to send them back in one, three, five, ten or twenty years.

"Earth's Black Box"—a city bus-sized structure with steel walls, battery storage and solar panels located at a remote site in Tasmania, Australia—will accumulate and electronically store comprehensive climate research and related data, including land and sea temperature changes, ocean acidification, atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, human population, energy consumption, military spending, and policy changes. The box was conceived to tell future civilizations how humankind created the climate crisis, and how it failed or succeeded in addressing it.

On February 22, 2024, the Arch Mission Foundation landed the Lunar Library on the Moon, containing the English Wikipedia and other content, with the GLL Lunaprise mission, on the Intuitive Machines IM-1 mission.