Seaside’s unearthed time capsule offers a glimpse into the hopes and fears of the 1970s.

Kevin Jewell here. As part of Seaside’s Fourth of July celebration next to City Hall, appropriate for America’s 250th milestone, was the opening of a time capsule, envisioned and placed into the ground for 50 years, next to the Seaside library by the Seaside Kiwanis. 

The 200-pound galvanized-line, concrete box lay on a table with a gathering crowd, waiting for the power to come back on, so Mayor Ian Oglesby could address the audience. After introductory remarks, two city workers pulled the chains to remove the lid, exposing the contents. Inside were mostly paper items—newspapers, a phonebook (remember those?), an election ballot, a school ID card—turning brown and flakey, because that is what paper does over time. A can of Hamm’s beer, which at some point opened up and leaked over everything, accelerated the process. 

While city officials were spreading the capsule contents as carefully as they could onto a long table, trying to keep paper shreds from scattering in the breeze, the mayor was talking about ideas for things to refill the capsule, and I wondered about the fate of the old contents—Would anyone spend time and money to really go though the contents, or would someone bag it up and just hand it over to the library or the Kiwanis?

An interesting use of AI: My wife took some photos of the capsule’s contents on the table and uploaded them to an agent. It replied with quick insight, mostly suggesting, at that time, Seaside was mostly a military town, with not too much else happening. The ’70s around the Monterey Bay in general were relatively sleepy—tourism was waiting to really boom until after the construction of the Monterey Bay Aquarium and revitalization of Cannery Row.

Perhaps the most insightful item in the capsule was the Kiwanis letter written for the future. Scary, even, with the letter noting the CIA suggesting some form of population control, an increase in nuclear reactors to combat our energy shortage, and the increasing “struggle between the haves and have-nots.”

The idea to refill the capsule seems like an appropriate one. In the next 50 years I’m sure we will experience logarithmic change in many unseen but hopeful directions. Just don’t put a bunch of paper and a can of beer in there together.