113-Year-Old Time Capsule Found Atop Old State House

Credit: Chensiyuan via Wikimedia Commons

By April Newell 09-28-14

Boston officials are stumped about how they are going to retrieve a 113-year-old time capsule from inside a lion statue on top of the Old State House.

A 1901 Boston Daily Globe article states the time capsule is a copper box holding mementos of elected officials of the time and daily Boston newspapers; an according to Reuters, the box holds the presidential campaigns of William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt.

The 1901 article reads that the copper box is sealed and rests inside the head of the iconic golden lion statue on top of the 301-year-old Old State House on Washington Street.  A fiber-optic camera threaded into a hole in the statue confirms the box’s existence.

The golden lion statue, an old symbol for the British monarchy, was taken off the building for maintenance earlier this month, and the Bostonian Society wants to use the opportunity to open the capsule.

After the time capsule is opened, the Bostonian Society intends to add new artifacts to the copper box.  After crowd-sourcing ideas on Twitter, locals have suggested “Boston Strong” gear and Dunkin Donuts cups to memorialize the present.