This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
When Gov. Gary Herbert opened the time capsule removed from one of the columns at the State Capitol last month, the contents were disappointing.
Cutting open the 100-year-old copper box revealed nothing more than few coins and a bunch of newspapers and pamphlets. Boring.
The items are probably of some interest for true historians, but I was hoping for something really amazing. Time capsules should always contain at least a couple of true marvels.
What did I expect? Hell, I don't know. Perhaps the shackles that Joe Hill wore, or an ancient Nephite artifact, or possibly even somebody's head in a bag.
When it comes to time capsule surprises, I'm not suggesting a functioning bomb or even a rabid tortoise. But surely they should cause genuine pause and reflection.
Tell The Tribune: What should go in Utah's new time capsule?
I opened a time capsule of my own on Saturday. Nearly 50 years after trying to punch my sister through the dining room window, a small piece of glass in my arm had finally worked its way close enough to the surface for a little self-surgery.
Using an X-ACTO knife, I sliced myself open and pulled it out — or rather, my granddaughter Hallie did while I squeezed it to the surface. It was about the size of a small sesame seed and had been in my arm since the summer of '68.
The piece of glass is a tangible reminder of a moment in time when I was even stupider than I am right now. It's a painful but necessary reflection. If nothing else, it serves to remind me that the person to be punched should be on the same side of the window as myself.
Maybe that's the point of such small bits and pieces of the past coming to the surface. They serve as encapsulated memories of how we got where we are today.
See, it isn't that there were some old newspapers in the Capitol's time capsule that makes it interesting — it's the stories in them.
For example, exactly 100 years ago today (Nov. 3, 1916) the Salt Lake County commission decided to have the roads of 2100 South and State Street south of Sandy sprinkled with water in advance of sheep being driven along them. It spared the residents of having to breath in all the dust.
If your last name is Skillicorn, you might be interested to know that any idiocy in your family is not entirely your fault — rather that of ancestral first cousins Zella and Earl who were married and had a child. A hundred years ago today, Zella petitioned to have the marriage annulled.
Meanwhile, Murray Mayor J.W. McHenry declared exactly a century ago that he was sick of automobiles using the city's newly cemented roads as a race track. He orders the city marshal to show no mercy in enforcing the speed laws.
And if you have any Rasmussens in your genealogy, it might be nice to know that the automatic fenders — of which there are none today — on Salt Lake's street cars just might be the reason you're here today.
A hundred years ago, the automatic fender saved the life of Miss Vesta Rasmussen, 20, when she got off a street car at South Temple and A Street and walked into the path of another coming from the opposite direction.
Every one of us is the direct result of a million unremembered time capsules that are just waiting to be opened.
Robert Kirby can be reached at rkirby@sltrib.com or facebook.com/stillnotpatbagley. —
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