Moss Point Opens a Time Capsule, Seals a New One

On the Fourth of July, a crowd gathered on the downtown Moss Point riverfront and watched the City lift a piece of its past out of the ground. A time capsule had been buried here beside the Escatawpa in 1976, sealed to wait half a century. This summer the wait ran out. The City opened the capsule in front of everyone, laid its keepsakes out on the table, and then sealed a new one in the same ground for the people of 2076.

A time capsule sealed during the Bicentennial

Fifty years ago, the country was marking its two hundredth birthday. During the 1976 Bicentennial, Moss Point sealed a set of keepsakes into a capsule, buried it on the riverfront, and set it to be opened in fifty years.

It landed on a big year for the city, too. Moss Point incorporated in 1901, which makes 2026 its 125th anniversary. Opening the capsule on the Fourth, in the middle of the riverfront’s Celebrate America 250 festivities, folded all three moments into a single afternoon.

What fifty years kept

Public works crews opened the ground and worked the old capsule loose. One of them stood down in the pit and handed the recovered contents up in a plastic bag to Alderman at Large David Chapman, who carried them to a table draped in a River City banner.

Then, piece by piece, fifty years came back into the light: steins with bright red lids, weathered glass bottles, old coins and a dollar bill, and a yellowed front page from the Mississippi Press Register. The newspaper went up for the crowd to see, the same front page the town had set aside half a century before.

Sealed again, for 2076

With the old capsule open, the City filled a new one and set it into the same ground, sealed to be opened in 2076. Whatever is inside is meant for a generation that has not been born yet.

The children who pressed in for a closer look at the old keepsakes are the ones most likely to be standing here when the new capsule comes back up. Fifty years from now, they will be the grandparents in the crowd, telling the story of the Fourth of July when they watched the last one open.

The story stays on the river

The capsule is one short chapter in a long story, and Moss Point has kept the rest of it close. You can follow the whole timeline, from the moss draped oaks that gave the city its name down to this summer’s ceremony, on the City’s narrated history tour, where the capsule now has a permanent place near the end.

There is always something happening on the riverfront and around town. To catch the next parade, festival, or community gathering, keep an eye on the Moss Point community calendar. The next fifty years of the city’s story start now, and everyone here gets a hand in writing them.