Don't Open Until 8113

In the Ozark Hills near Rogers, Ark. is the base of an uncompleted pyramid which was intended to be a hermetically sealed, steel & concrete structure 130 ft. high, and to house documents and relics of the present U. S. civilization for the benefit of future archeologists. Builder was tottering, half-blind William Hope ("Coin") Harvey, who left his pyramid unfinished when he died last spring at the age of 85. Believing that the worms of decay were making fast work within the body of society, "Coin" Harvey planned to place at his pyramid's summit the steel-lettered legend: Go below and find the cause of the death of a civilization.

Another man who thinks of the future, though by no means in such pessimistic terms as "Coin" Harvey, is wiry, grey-haired Thornwell Jacobs, president of Atlanta's Oglethorpe University. Having revived Oglethorpe in 1915 from the suspended animation in which it had languished since its students marched off to the Civil War. Dr. Jacobs runs a strictly non-communist institution. Last week, in an article published by Scientific American. Dr. Jacobs revealed' that Oglethorpe is ready to go ahead with an ambitious, scientific, costly and carefully planned conservation project for the benefit of archeologists in the year 8113 A. D. This particular date was chosen. Dr. Jacobs said, because the first recorded date in history is 4241 B. C., in which year the Egyptian calendar was established. Since that date 6,177 years have passed. Adding 6,177 years to 1936 A. D. brings one to 8113.

Chosen for a storehouse was the basement of a fireproof building on the Oglethorpe campus, whose foundations rest on ancient bedrock which is not likely to be visited by earthquakes. This roomy crypt has already been rendered waterproof. In it Dr. Jacobs and the Scientific American, which has promised enthusiastic cooperation, proposed to place a phonograph or sound film record bearing a salutation from the President of the U. S. to the potentates of 8113; recordings of the voices of King Edward, Stalin. Mussolini, Hitler. Emperor Hirohito and President Lin Shen; encyclopedias and newspapers: stainless steel or Monel metal models of furniture, printing presses, automobiles, airplanes, typewriters, etc.: a film projection machine with instructions for its operation; specimens of food, drink and chewing gum. Perishable materials might be sealed in an atmosphere of inert gases like neon or argon.

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