News

By Ron Hayes
    Would you spend a little time to give the past a future?
    In 1986, the Delray Beach Historical Society created a time capsule to mark the city’s Diamond Jubilee.
    Among other items, the capsule held a cassette tape from C. Spencer Pompey, a local civil rights activist and teacher; letters from former Police Chief Charles Kilgore, photos of area residents and a letter from Ruth Ann Kuehn to her infant nephew, Jared Charles Malke.
    To mark the city’s centennial this year, that capsule was opened on Oct. 9 and the items put on display at the society’s Ethel Sterling Williams Learning Center, 111 N. Swinton Ave.
    Now the capsule is empty again — and waiting for you to help fill it.
    “We’ll be accepting items through Jan. 31,” says the society’s archivist, Dottie Patterson. “It’s $10 per item, with the money going to the Delray Beach Historical Society.”
    Only nonperishable items, please. They have to survive until Oct. 9, 2036, when the city turns 125 and the capsule is opened once more.
    “At first we were thinking of 50 years,” Patterson says, “but I asked them to change it to 25 because in 50 years most of the connections and people who would be interested will probably be gone.”
    As time capsules go, this one is a bit eccentric.
    “It’s a bright blue metal box,” Patterson says. “About 20 inches by 20 inches. It’ll be screwed down and hermetically sealed.”
    But not buried.
    “The publicity for the 1986 capsule said it was going to Old School Square, but it actually came to the historical society and was sent to a storage unit at Merritt Transport & Storage,” Patterson says.
    Items are already arriving.
    Michael Zaidman, senior archivist at the Jim Moran Foundation in Deerfield Beach, is donating his first-place medal from the 2010 Pineapple Grove Bed Race.
    McCall Credle-Rosenthal has donated a copy of her book, Images of America, Delray Beach, and Sharon Kosoff has donated an article about local artists.
    Local real estate agent Kathie Karp has included a photograph of the ocean.
    “She thought the beach might change,” Patterson said.
    Patterson is especially eager to have people include letters they’ve written to yet-to-be born family member, or a grandchild who’s still quite young.
    “Somebody asked me about putting in a pair of stylish shoes,” she added “That might be kind of fun.”
    For more information, call the Delray Beach Historical Society at (561) 274-9578.