Time capsule

In 1938, Westinghouse buried a time capsule fifty feet beneath the site of the New York World's Fair.

It's filled with everyday items from the 1930s, and the instructions say not to open it until sixty-nine thirty-nine.

Sixty-nine thirty-nine.

[upbeat music] What were they thinking? Will they even know where they buried it? Is that going to survive four thousand years? Will the instructions survive four thousand, almost five thousand years? We'll see.

If anybody's hearing this in four thousand nine hundred years or so from now, send me a text, five one three three nine nine six four six eight.

And let me know what is in that time capsule.

[laughs] Well, hello my friend, I'm Simple Joe.

I'm so glad you're here.

Whatever.

Capsule.

Whatever.

What? I mean, what, what am I putting in there? What, what, I can't put more, I can't put food in the motherfucker.

Yeah, as I guess we knew at the time and we've continued to hear in the years since, especially on Talkville and whatnot and at these convention appearances.

Yeah, time capsule, I think, is the perfect term.

That was the feeling that I had.

I did feel like I was time traveling back to that era as I was looking through it.

And, you know, it's the kind of thing that, you know, they send all the press there to like have have little bits and pieces for their blurbs.

And that's the purpose of that.

But I bet it's cool to have some specific just, again, time capsule is the name of the game here.

But I will read.

Oh, yes.

The 1938 Book of Record of the Time Capsule of Kupiloy.

It is a profound paradox that we are about to explore here because there's this tension, right? The tension between the physical object they were celebrating, this heavy, immutable metal tube designed to survive millennia, and the medium they actually used to celebrate it.

Right.

Yeah, specifically themed the world of tomorrow.

And it's constructed out in the marshlands of Flushing Meadows, Long Island.

And the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company decides they are going to bury a time capsule.

And that phrase time capsule is actually a product of this exact era.

Do you think she'll remember it? Yeah.

See, people don't remember what they've put in a time capsule, John.

Even some, only a couple of years afterwards, they go, I thought of it at the time, it's what I wanted, I put it in a time capsule, and now I have no idea what it is, as has been demonstrated by almost every one of our guests who's come back and spoken to us, which I think is, you know, perfectly understandable, but very interesting, don't you? Very

interesting.

Well, I think she'd remember that, though.

Well done.

Yeah, I am a professional.

So let's have a listen to what she wanted to, where she wanted to bury a time capsule.

Rocks!

uh tell me about the time capsule because i really really really don't know i know that there was one that was uh this is the big one big this is the big one this big beautiful time capsule

that's the one they buried in philadelphia

right

Yeah, they were the metal detector.

So I'm disappointed in our state for that.

Well, the whole time capsule sucks.

Like, who's going to want to dig it up? I guess they have to because they'll keep talking about it.

this is pretty cool.

This was a two-minute clip I saw from Time Capsules, I believe is the Twitter, the X feed.

This is 1998.

Two dudes are in a mall, and they have a shopping spree, 20 grand to spend.

Cliffless is not a name.

So, yeah, he's got an Instagram page called British Pop Time Capsule.

And he explains it in the interview.

Basically, in 96, well, around 95, 96, he took loads of video of Brit pop bands, basically, British bands.