ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, December 6, 1995 TAG: 9512060096
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ALMENA HUGHES STAFF WRITER
Perhaps it's the promise of posterity that prompts people to punctuate occasions by packing supposedly relevant items into hopefully long-lived containers and planting them in the ground to be exhumed and presumably appreciated by generations 50 or 100 years hence.
It's a great idea on the surface. But exactly how do you calendar that sort of thing? Face it. By then, most of those doing the planting will have been planted or otherwise interred themselves. So who's to be responsible for digging up the capsule, and how will they know?
Janet Reinhold, a former packaging specialist with the United States Army, has been supplying assorted clients with time capsules since 1986. Her Future Packaging and Preservation company, in fact, supplied the red metal, gas-purged capsule that will be planted in Lee Plaza Thursday as part of a ceremony marking the opening of an exhibit at the Roanoke Valley History Museum. The capsule in question will contain items relevant to the 29th Infantry Division, and specifically to the Roanoke- and Bedford-based 116th Regiment's involvement in World War II's D-Day invasion.
Reinhold said she's already supplied the exhibit's curator, David Hicks, with one of the most common capsule-tracking methods - paperwork to register with the International Time Capsule Society in Atlanta, Ga. The society, at Ogelthorpe University, will see to it that the right party is contacted at the appropriate dig-up time, Reinhold said from her office in Covina, Calif.
``Some people engrave the capsule and put a plaque above the capsule site,'' Reinhold said. Others put notice of the opening date in their safe deposit box.
One of Reinhold's clients, the City of Whittier, Calif., had three boxes made up listing its capsule's location and dig-up date. The boxes will be inherited with their jobs by the city's future mayors and administrators at its museum and hospital. Another less methodical client passed out cards to kids, who statistically will be around in the dig-up year, saying something like, ``Expect to see you back here in 2039 for the opening of this capsule.''
Encapsulation - including preventing corrosion; controlling heat, moisture and Ph balances; expelling gases; and finding a way to, say, weld the capsule closed without melting that relevant chocolate bar entry - can get pretty complicated, Reinhold said.
Capsules can get pricey, too, she said, with costs starting at about $400 and ranging upwards into the thousands, depending upon the container's size, treatment, contents and other factors. She'd love to be able to accommodate the many people who approach her about time capsules for wedding gifts, she said. But so far, she hasn't been able to come up with a more affordable method.
It's expensive to create a container that will endure. A time capsule gone bad is, well, not a pretty sight.
Reinhold said she witnessed the opening of a capsule that was planted right before the stock market crash of 1929. The box was copper and some of its contents had rusted, but overall, the items fared pretty well. Another capsule, however, had gone bad and its paper contents had turned mushy.
As for ``relevant'' items, Reinhold said what she's seen hasn't been all that odd. She remembers a condor's feather, various plant sprigs and, once, a grunion.
Contact Reinhold at P.O. Box 4001, Covina, Calif. 91723, (800) 786-6627.
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