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A time capsule of current events was installed on Saturday in the massive pedestal that once housed a statue dedicated to Confederate General Robert E. Lee.
Teams gathered on Saturday at the site in Richmond, Virginia, where the statue of Lee was removed to install the capsule full of memorabilia marking major news events, a government official confirmed to The Associated Press. The time capsule was installed in the pedestal that once served as the base for the Confederate statue.
The capsule includes material related to the coronavirus pandemic and the race for racial justice in the months following the murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police.
The Hill contacted the office of Virginia Governor Ralph Northam (D) for further information.
The installation comes after teams spent more than 12 hours Thursday trying to locate an 1887 time capsule that officials said was buried in the 40-foot-high granite pedestal beneath the statue of Lee.
However, the AP noted that crews were unable to locate the original copper capsule, despite using ground-penetrating radars, a metal detector and other construction equipment.
Northam Chief of Staff Clark Mercer told the AP after crews called off the search: “It’s disappointing not to find the time capsule.”
“We looked at where we thought he was,” he added. “That doesn’t prevent us from finding him in the future, but for now the mystery will continue.”
Hundreds of people gathered in the area on Wednesday to celebrate the removal of the statue of Lee, which for years had been viewed by critics as an enduring symbol of white supremacy.
People cheered as a huge crane lifted the monument off the pedestal and onto the ground, before workers began to chop the statue into pieces so that it could be easily transported under road overpasses to a facility owned by the ‘State where she should stay until a final decision regarding her placement is made.
Northam first announced in June 2020 that the statue would be removed, although the project was delayed for more than a year due to lawsuits brought by a group of Richmond residents and a descendant of the family who offered the statue to Virginia.
The Virginia Supreme Court unanimously ruled earlier this month to go ahead with the statue’s removal, arguing that the state government was is not liable for previous agreements that previously prohibited the removal of state-owned monuments.
Northam was among those who gathered on Wednesday to witness the dismantling of the statue, then writing in a statement: “It’s time to display history as history and use public memorials to honor the full and inclusive truth of who we are today and into the future. “
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