The wind lifted the tents and whisked away the voices of student alumni, faculty, and community members — all while the bolts were screwed into the 2025 Time Capsule. This cold wind did not stop everyone from enjoying a toast to the next century, and a toast to the people who are set to open the capsule.
This was not the first time that Concordia installed a capsule. In fact, the university was built around the first one. Built into the cornerstone, 2025 CUE faculty had to have it cut out of the building.
“We felt this [time capsule] was a gift from the past,” says CUE’s President Tim Loreman, “And we wanted to give that same gift to people in 100 years time.”
The old capsule featured many items, but the most notable were an Edmonton Journal newspaper — toting a Colonization display at the next town fair — and a German-written Concordia “House Rules,”— which tells students to regularly attend morning and evening devotions, and prohibited indecent behaviour.
“[Much] of that doesn’t relate to where we are as an institution today,” says Judy Kruse, University Secretary. “That’s what they valued. That’s how the institution began.”
Colonization and Indecent behaviour aside, the other subtle issue with the old capsule was the lack of student voice. There are voices from the Edmonton Journal about the “New Concordia College.” There are voices from the staff and faculty (in German!). There is even a map of Edmonton from that time. But no student voice.
2025 CUE decided to do something different.
Inside CUE and spread across a table are countless items from convocation, CUE Athletics, Campus event photos, the 2025 student handbook, and the letters from students and faculty: “Each of them comes from a different perspective and talks about their relationship with the institution,” says Kruse.
Other items in the new capsule also included coins that were truth and reconciliation themed, an Edify magazine, an AMA Edmonton Tourist guide, and a business card from Janusz Najfeldt, who built the new capsule, and who snuck his card in as the capsule was being installed.
Kruse says: “Hopefully in 100 years when they open it. or if they choose to open it earlier than that, they’ll get a true reflection of what the environment is like.”
While the time capsule itself is now installed in the cornerstone, there are copies of every item created for display in a room in the university.
Loreman says that writing about the future is difficult, and all that he could really do is write about what he hopes continues for CUE and what he feels will happen.
“Then they can have a good laugh in 100 years when they see none of that happened and Something completely different happened.”
