April 15: A good story worth retelling

I loved those old Chrysler cars from the late '50's. Even though they turned out to be junk - poor quality and lots of rust - they had "the look". Obviously, I'm not the only one who liked them, as their initial sales were strong until the problems arose. Well, way back in 1957, Tulsa, Oklahoma decided to put together a time capsule. According to Wikipedia, the folks of Tulsa wanted to show "the good taste and forward thinking of the people of 1957". This time capsule was to be opened 50 years later in 2007 (you can tell that this isn't a current story). So among the odds and ends of the day, what did the good folks of Tulsa choose to place in their capsule? If you said, A '57 Plymouth, then you have already heard about this story or you looked ahead at the pics.........

There she is, that beautiful 1957 Plymouth Belvedere, just before she was lowered into her tomb for a 50 year rest (the two girls got out just in time). Now, the citizens of Tulsa were nothing if not optimistic. Reason? They sold tickets on this Plymouth. Just guess the population of Tulsa in 50 years and you'd win this hot looking car in 2007. Optimistic, because how many of those solid Tulsa citizens were going to be around in another 50 years?

Flash forward to the great unveiling back in 2007........

Oops! This time capsule that was built to protect against a nuclear bomb, wasn't quite without its flaws, as you can see from the pic above and this one.......

The flaw? While rock solid, that capsule wasn't airtight and it also leaked. So when the area flooded out, well you can see the outcome. That gorgeous old Plymouth was not gorgeous anymore. Wonder how the winner of the contest felt? Well, they were also buried, but back in '79. And their closest relative? Same thing. Finally went to a distant cousin or someone like that. Think that they were thrilled? Hardly, as the air and water had wrecked havoc on this old beauty. Everything was either rusted or rotted. No lovingly applied coat of wax was going to bring this baby back (for an update check out www.hemmings.com/newsletter/).

Moral of the story........when you are burying some artifacts to impress those folks in the future, spend as much time thinking about the capsule itself as opposed to just what goes into it.

Until next time.....