By 1940, Jacobs’s tone had changed, stifled by the rise of fascism and America’s entry into a global war. At the ceremony to seal the vault, he made a very different statement: “The world is now engaged in burying our civilization forever, and here in this crypt we leave it to you.” His speech was recorded and placed in the vault before it was sealed.
The Oglethorpe crypt was built during the heyday of time capsules, probably driven by the fear, shared by Jacobs, that humanity was on the verge of extinction, and by the desire to preserve something—a seed that would bloom after winter had passed.
.. Ten thousand standard letter-sized sheets of text or more could fit onto a 2.2-inch diameter nickel plate. The “
Times capsule,” a two-ton, stainless-steel above-ground sculpture