Greene County Parks & Trails has new home: ‘Really a special day for us’
With careful instruction from Robin Heise, the Greene County records manager and archivist, numerous members from different parks departments chose their own cherished items to stow away from the next century. Heise said the idea to include a time capsule in the new building at 635 Dayton-Xenia Rd. came this summer when the county discovered and opened a 50-year-old capsule buried in the Greene County Jail.
“Upon opening these copper boxes, it’s almost like traveling back in time,” Heise said before the 1969 box was opened this summer. “The artifacts symbolize what was important to the generation who sealed the box and provides the generation opening it with a sense of continuity, identity, and their cultural heritage.”
As mystery and secrecy is part of the fun surrounding time capsules, Heise only disclosed a few items she could confirm were sealed in the capsule including a Frisbee, a few ranger badges and a map of each Greene County park.
Related: Greene County capsule from 1969 to be opened
About 30 items were placed in the capsule.
Despite Heise’s strong urge not to include technology, parks staff included a flash drive with photos. In case her hunch is correct and the future generation isn’t able to access the photos anymore, Heise included a hand-written letter to the people of 2119, telling them they can find the photos in the county archival collections — assuming it’s still a physical space 100 years from now.
In 2001, another time capsule was removed from the county court house, Heise said. One more time capsule is known to exist in the county, however, Heise said she could not reveal its whereabouts because they are in the process of trying to locate the box.
“None of us will be here, so it’s really bizarre to think of that,” Heise said. “It’s hard to think about what people will be like 100 years from now and what they’ll think of us looking at the items we put in there.”
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