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by Andrew Dalke.
Original Post: Time capsule
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One of the things it mentioned was the time
capsule buried then, to be opened in 5,000 years. The term time capsule was
invented specifically for it, though the
practice is older. How will the people of the year 6939 know
about the time capsule? One way was to publish a book, with copies
sent to libraries
and archives around the world, titled The
Book of Record of The Time Capsule. On acid free paper that
should last a long time, with copies distributed widely, in the hopes
that in the deep future someone will come across it and think to find
and open the capsule.
I read part of the book. It's in the somewhat florid style of the
time, which I think gets its influence from oratory.
By A.D. 6939, it is probable, all present-day landmarks, city surveys,
and other such aids for locating such an object will have
disappeared. The spot may still be discovered, however, by
determination of the latitude and longitude. The exact geodetic
coordinates [North American Datum of 1927J are :
Latitude 40° 44' 34". 089 north of the Equator
Longitude 73° 50' 43".842 west of Greenwich
I'm writing this only 68 years in the future. There are people still
alive who were at that fair. I could find the capsule's location in
many ways, but I decided to use the lat/long. Using Google
maps I see it's in Flushing Meadows Park, which is also where
other sources say it is. But it's very close to some limited access
roads and doesn't appear to be anything at the spot.
We no longer use the North American Datum of 1927. I converted from NAD27
to NAD83 to get 40° 44' 34.45671" N by 73° 50' 42.32593" W, which is a shift of 37.289 meters. Bingo! Arrow marks the spot.
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