This Week In Time Capsules: Teaching Kids About The Cruel March Of Time

This Week In Time Capsules: Teaching Kids About The Cruel March Of Time

This week in our round-up of time capsule news we have a 20-year-old McDonald’s capsule that only 90s kids will understand, a “time barrel” in Maine, and kids in the UK who learn that we eventually get old and die.

Kids bury capsule at elderly care facility with predictions for 2064

A group of schoolchildren in the UK have sealed a time capsule at a new elderly care facility with their visions for the world of 2064. Their predictions are strikingly similar to the kind that kids were making in the 1970s — that strange mix of youthful optimism and a nagging fear about the future of a dangerous and broken world.

As the local Grantham Journal reports, “the youngsters came up with everything from the existence of jet-propelled broccoli to ensure everyone in the future eats their greens, to forseeing World War Three.”

Maybe it’s just me, but getting a group of kids to bury a 50-year time capsule at an elderly care facility that they may one day occupy is both genius and a bit warped. I hope the kids had a good hard think about death and the cruelty of ageing while they were there. Time capsules are such a great learning opportunity. [Grantham Journal]

McDonald’s play area capsule from 1994 to be unearthed

A time capsule buried at a McDonald’s in 1994 will be unearthed this weekend in Washington. Students at Salmon Creek Elementary School in the Evergreen State buried the time capsule under a pile of concrete in the play area 20 years ago this month. The opening ceremony is at 2pm this Sunday when attendees will discover what the kids of 1994 deemed worthy for inclusion. Here’s hoping there’s at least one McPizza box inside. [The Columbian]

Time capsule potato barrel opened in Maine

A time barrel from 1989 was opened this past weekend in Aroostock County, Maine. Unfortunately, the barrel’s contents weren’t terribly exciting. In fact, pretty much everything pulled from the time barrel looked like it was just shipped in from some local bureaucrat’s hoarder house. Among the discoveries were lots of 1989 newspapers, local government annual reports, and a lone baseball hat. Thankfully, they will be sealing all of the 1989 items into a new time capsule that will be opened in another 25 years, making it one of those leapfrogging capsules that’s all the rage these days. [St. John Valley Times]


Image: Kids from Huntingtower Primary School bury a time capsule via Grantham Journal


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