The time capsule buried half a century ago was recovered on June 28 at the site of the former vocational school which now serves as the Department of Education building.
It’s located on Lewes Boulevard, left of the Robert Campbell Bridge coming into Riverdale.
The capsule was buried in the concrete base that once supported a steel sculpture that had been created by the instructors and students at the vocational school 50 years ago.
The capsule would have been long forgotten had it not been for the intervention of Donna Clayson, a former employee at the school. Clayson was there to witness the original burial of the capsule.
Former instructor, and later widely renowned artist, Ted Harrison, gathered contributions from students and faculty at the school and placed a container before the concrete was poured.
Clayson remembered this event and her time at the vocational school. She’d recently begun her campaign to have the capsule recovered from the dark confines of its cement tomb. For the past two months, she has been on the telephone constantly, reaching out to anybody she thought might have an interest, from the City of Whitehorse and territorial government officials, to Yukon University staff and private sector businesses.
A May 14 Yukon News article sparked interest in readers, several of whom reached out about the project. One of those who communicated with Clayson was Erin Stavenjord. Stavenjord is the daughter of Bob McCowan, the welding instructor who was involved in the creation of the steel sculpture (now known as The Tree of Knowledge) in 1973. It is currently located in the traffic circle in front of Yukon University.
Stavenjord contacted Mark Kelly of Kelly Construction and told him about this project. She gave Clayson’s phone number to him, and after talking to her for a few minutes, he told her that he “would get it out.” Kelly knew about the time capsule and the McCowans were friends of the family.
“It was a pretty neat little project and I’m not going to open another one in my lifetime,” he said.
Kelly reached out to others in the construction sector, who were also drawn into the project. Arcrite Northern Ltd. provided remote sensing equipment and staff in hopes of locating the capsule within the concrete block. The result seemed to confirm early suspicions that it was located near the top north-east corner of the block, though scrutiny of a photo of the capsule as it was being placed in 1973 suggested another location within the massive concrete slab.
As it turned out, the latter was the correct.
Using an expanding grout called Dexpan, Kelly’s crew drilled holes in the top of the slab and poured the Dexpan into the holes. The powerful expanding force of the grout split the block into several pieces. The upper third of the base was successfully split apart, but that was only the beginning. Different tools were used to break up the massive block, including special saws and a small jackhammer that allowed for sensitive control.
The official opening of the capsule was scheduled for 2:30 p.m. June 28, but as the time approached, the bulk of the block had yet to be broken apart. As a crowd of 60 to 100 onlookers gathered to witness the event, heavy equipment was brought in and a large jackhammer was attached to a backhoe. As the expectant crowd looked on, this equipment upgrade pounded away at the hardened mass, making quick progress. Elements of the metal base of the steel sculpture embedded in the cement had to be removed and the jackhammer bit deeper and deeper into the block.
For nearly an hour, the onlookers watched as the hammer gnawed farther into the block. Eventually a shout was issued and the excavation came to a halt. The crowd moved in close to the fencing that surrounded the site to get a closer look. Centrally located near the bottom of the block, a plastic container was exposed. More delicate equipment was brought in to chip away at the surrounding matrix, until the container was wrestled from the concrete where it had been trapped for 50 years.
The container was held up for all to see, then handed to a tearful Clayson, who, having waited so long for this moment, held it in a firm embrace.
In an interview later, a tired Clayson said, “Was I a little nervous? Well, probably.”
But her firm belief that the capsule was there never wavered.
“Every time I crossed the [Robert Campbell] bridge, I would look at the site, and as the days drew closer [to the anniversary], I knew there were only me and Hazel Fekete who knew about it. When we go, there is nobody [left to remember]. My concern was, let’s get this done. We knew it was in there.
“After thinking about this day since 2011, when it finally came out, I looked at Hazel and thought about McCowan’s daughter [and all the others]. I was emotional, not for me, but emotional for them. For all of the instructors, dead or alive, family members, that now we had closure.”
Due to the fragile nature of the contents, it was decided to put the recovery in the hands of experts. The capsule will be taken to the Yukon Archives, where the conservator will carefully bring the documents to light. In the meantime, the creators of the notes and letters stored there for the last 50 years, and their families, will have to wait a little longer.
Clayson and several other people confessed that after all these years, they cannot remember precisely what they wrote in their contributions. So it will be with great anticipation, mixed with surprise, that they will read the contents after all this time.
Michael Gates is Yukon’s first Story Laureate. His latest book, “Hollywood in the Klondike,” is now available in Yukon stores. You can contact him at msgates@northwestel.net
