Bush pushed president world war wilson watch beginning at eight eastern and enjoy American History tv every weekend on cspan 3. In 1915, the president Woodrow Wilson place the memorable box in the cornerstone at the memorial 105 years later, in april 2020, the box was carefully removed and opened to discover what was inside. Next on american artifacts, we visit arlington to see the contents with cemetery historians tim frank and conservator caitlin smith. In order to talk about this member label and cornerstone we really have to take you back to 1864, and bringing forward to 1950. In 1864 we buried the first soldier here, private william, in may of 1864, and one month later, the secretary of war satisfy 200 acres to become a national secretary. By the end of the civil war, there were 15,000 union and confederate soldiers buried here, and in 1868, general john logan who come under the grand army of the republic, the Civil War Veterans Organization established Decoration Day, which he declared may 30th of every year as Decoration Day at the idea was throughout the country people would visit the graves of the civil war fall in and place flowers on those grace. And a Decoration Day eventually became a memorial day, it became so popular, that in 1873, quartermaster general montgomery makes, designed a small amphitheater near the arlington house to kind of hold the festivity Decoration Day ceremonies. In time, that became such a small venue because every year thousands of people would show up to arlington, and one year, we found that 25,000 people showed up to decorate the graves so in 1913 congress authorized this memorial amphitheater that we are standing in, and in 1950, as part of the leg of the cornerstone, this memorabilia box was placed by president Woodrow Wilson. Using us some lay the first stone, and that now brings us to the memorabilia box and its history. So when the memorial amphitheater began construction in 1915, the construction dragged on for about five years, and the amphitheater was actually dedicated in 1920. The building has largely the same as its been for 100 years, but there have been over time several modifications, one of the largest was in the 1970s. As the viewing of the changing of the guard and the tomb of the unknown became so popular, the steps in the plaza around the tomb were expanded. When that expanded, the steps covered up the original cornerstone, so in the 19 seventies, a new false cavity and a new false cornerstone was added to the building. At that time, the box was removed from the building turned construction. It temporarily went to the national archives. It was there for about a year. It was then given back to the cemetery, and stored, it wasnt until the 19 nineties that the box was put back into the building itself. There is other construction going on, and they took the opportunity to place the bucks back in the building. It wasnt revealed again until this year, 2020, when we were celebrating that adversary of the memorial and theaters construction. We take the box out in april just before the with the covid pandemic the cemetery wanted to make sure that we had the opportunity to let the public see the opening of the box. So in preparation for the anniversary, we were doing online exhibit. We opened the box in april and by may we had the online exhibits available to the general public. My role and opening the boxes i was one of a large team of anc staff. Hes the one who to lot of the research into the memorabilia box. Which was in it. But it was constructed of. I was concerned with opening of the box. With the opening of the cornerstone first. Once they extracted the cornerstone from the backs they brought here to the chapel. We took it to clean space. Our videographer, our photographer, myself, were all there to talk with opening to make sure that we had the documents. We created a clean space here in the chapel. And weve slowly and carefully opened the memorabilia box. So thanks to temps research we had some idea of what would be inside the memorabilia box. But there are still some unknowns. The box was as expected copper, thats what you see in front of. Me this is actually the outer box. So this is all we knew. Timothy taken this box actually to our welcome, center to xray machine to find what is inside. We had some idea of with objects were but we still werent really certain. So when i began opening box, i began with a series of holes that had rolled into one of the corners. We gradually opened a larger and larger hole until we could its a brisk up to the box and see whats inside. Once we put it inside we realized there was indeed a second cover box. And we were really talked to find everything appeared to be in Good Condition inside. So knowing that there were no historical objects in the way we move forward with cutting open the outer box. So we began mostly with metal invitation snips clipping on the edge but was the original solder line. The boxes are very well constructed. Theyre out of copper. Fodder on the corners. On the top, there is a little lip where the slit sits inside. We cut along the light of the slaughter, and we were able to cut along the line, we were able to open up the lid, open it up with pliers, and revealed the box inside. We did find that there was a little bit of moisture, so the seals had opened up a little bit. But there was no cooling. No major damage. Theres simply glass inside. We have believed there to be some glass inside, we just dont know how much. We werent sure if those entire glass sheets. We found glass this was to give space between the two boxes. A air gap. There are also some middle straps holding them in place so they wouldnt wiggle around too much. We removed the glass. We removed the straps. And while i helped the box to pull out the inner box. The inner box was in slightly better shape, as the seals had held up to a greater degree. For this one, we took little extra care. We started cutting with stainless steel blades and saws along the salt line. We opened one corner first so we can again stick it in and make sure that the objects were in good historical condition. We wanted to make sure that we were not going to cut into any of the objects. We opened up a corner, and we stuck the bore scope in. At first look, everything looked great and dry. There were no major signs of damage. You can see everything at the bottom, we could see fleet at the top. Off so we could continue cutting with stainless steel blades. And we did use a middle theater on a rotary tool to cut right along the solder line and remove the lead. And with, that tim and i were the first to see the objects in 105. Years to a relief, the inner boxes had held up. Everything was dry, colorful, no signs of must or insect damage, or any real degradation. That is when we begun the process of carefully pulling up everything. Took us about two and half hours to carefully open the boxes. After that, we spent an additional hour carefully removing each historical objects, and placing into archival containers, and having ourselves and our photographer document carefully the condition of each object before we unwrapped, and started revealing them. I think one of the surprises was just how good of a condition everything was. There are so many things that could have gone wrong with a box like this. I have to say, throughout the process of caitlin opening the box, i thought my chest was going to explode. I just dont know what the contents would be. But they would look like. We knew it was in there, but like caitlin said, all sorts of things could have done wrong with the weather damage. At one point somebody said is that water at the bottom of the box and i just about fell over. So when kaitlan finished cutting the lid of the inside box, and she peeled back the lid, the first thing that struck me was just the condition and the care that they took to put this item in, just about everything was wrapped in tissue paper or wax paper. The flag was rolled up and tied carefully. Everything looked like it went in yesterday. So that was really what struck me. I just could not wait to get in and unwrap each item. For a historian, it is a once in a lifetime experience. The first items that we took out where the plate glass. You know, we really werent sure, the way the newspaper articles described it at the time its unlike that was played last all around the inner box. The metal bands were there are to hold it out, so we took this out, and we gift box out. The first item really, this was placed on the outer box. Its a metal plate with the names of all the members of the memorial at the theater commission. The simply laid on the other box when it was that the first artifact that we took off in conserved. When we open the box we started seeing what was important to them. We saw an advanced copy of the program for the laying of the cornerstone. They would have sealed all of this up the day before. Found coins and stamps that were in circulation at the time. Colonel william retired, here he was the disbursement officer of the commission, the post office contributed stamps. There is a buoyed city directory from 1915. Its interesting. Its kind of like the yellow pages today, place the advertisements on the spine, front covers or back covers. We had a official program from the republican attack in campaign that had just taken place. That ended this was the inspiration of the civil war veterans, judge ivory in particular was buried here at the cemetery. There is a copy of the declaration of independence. A copy of the constitution, which i might note it was before prohibition, and women had the right to vote. There was a United States flag. This is before there was theres a congressional directory, some congressional hearings on the memorial empathy. The president wilson prevent presented a autographed photo of himself. The commission had actually added a confederate veteran in the public buildings act of 19. 15 his contribution was a list of confederate debt. The architect was thomas hastings, the architect donated several items to the memorabilia box. For one, he didnt read the original, the early plans. These are a little too brittle to actually unfold. They were wrapped in red tape, thats where the term comes from, from records being wrapped in sort of this string. And he included a letter, which went with the plants. We have images of the original drawings which showed that the original structure looked different. It went through several iterations with a smaller reception building, only one story set of two. A structure at the east of the plaza. This was before the tomb of the unknown. Some things did stay the same. The arcade, the greek plan. This very grand style, the height of style in the twenties. So the building is meant to look like a greet amphitheater in the style. It has an access the mask of the, main commemorating the latest large war america at suffered. Through the architect also included the bible. Hes staying headed his family a grandfather who wrote him, and his father was a presbyterian clergymen, so its maybe and surprising that he donated this bible. Inside is his signature. On october, one hastings donated this bubble. Its pockmarked. Were not sure why. To the book of joshua. So rip up for the memorabilia box was put together unsealed, someones job was to run to d. C. And grab the four major papers from the day before. So the papers are all dated october 12th. The memorabilia box is from november 13th. This is a great snapshot in time of what was on everyones mind when the box put in place, and only one of the four paper still exist and that would be the post. The others were subsumed by, it or when they went under, the post but a lot of their equipment. It is a great snapshot. The headlines are things we still talk about today. Youve got, remember when the copy of the constitution was put in the box there were a number of amendments missing and we just celebrated the we have suffrage is stirring up trouble all over the news. Youve got wilsons impending wedding being covered. Remember at this point we havent yet entered the war. Once we enter world war i the construction of this building really slows down, and impacts it and a variety of ways and the mission is obviously dramatically changed. So theres hints of the war to come but obviously americas invented the. Were so you will see headlines related to bulgarians begin attacking serbia. And other references to overseas. Kind of like a city directory with everyone trying to vie for attention on the covers and spines, edges, the cigar into tobacco shop owners step to stamp on the newspapers. I could just imagine a officer running up to the scene and purchasing in a zipper from the newspaper stance. He was located on pennsylvania avenue and when i look at the newspapers the more things change, the more they stay the same. Weve the world series, sports news, at the time theres an and threats scare, so washington sciences discovering Agricultural Department comes to rescue quickly. We have the fight is on to close the bar in the armynavy glove. Wilson which ecole supporter wedding. Bulgarians begin attacking in serbia. Wilson seeks way to finance defense. Its just amazing, to sit here and read these and also just the condition they were in. They really did take great care in making sure that we were here to open this and not pull out a box of shredded memorabilia. This is the plan for washington, d. C. Whats interesting is that he is buried in arlington, overlooking the city that he designed. This is the map of the system of highways for the district of columbia. It was dated 1914. You will notice that the arlington reservation is right here, fort myers here. One of the items not on the inventory but that we knew was here was the list of confederate dead. People ask me why is this list included . 1915 was the 50th anniversary of the civil war. And you had these veterans reconciling. There was a big push to to reconcile between the north and the south and arlington was the centerpiece of the reconciliation. The public buildings act of the 1915 added a confederate veteran, so he placed the list of confederate dead as the Union Veterans placed their publican and encampment program. Another thing i wanted to point out is that, if you look at the original drawings, there was a statue planned. But all of that of 1920. Just months after this building was dedicated. The british and the french and turned the soldiers of world war i. And in particular there was a fullpage article in a newspaper describing a unknown funeral in london. A lot of precip recipients were present and veterans from all over the world, attaches that attended. The American People started writing the congress of War Department saying that we should offer this in u. S. In 1921, the unknown social soldier was buried in arlington. There was a personal attachment, another reason i couldnt wait to get into the boss was because of the boyd city directory. It actually had my grandfather listed there, robert to frank, clerk, district of columbia. He worked for the d. C. Government. So i was looking at family members that were here in d. C. At the time. I found the land sales but my greatgrandparents on my grandmother side but i did find my great grandfather, robert frank listed. Robert, clerk, district, 607 columbia road, northwest. So in the original box came back from the national archives, it was placed in a safe and in 1990 the superintendent, who was buried here, he made that termination it is time to place it back in the amphitheater. So the previous historian told me that he had about a 30 minute head start notice, they called up and said theyre going to put the memorabilia box in. He looked around and said he grabbed the peter pan Peanut Butter jar and theyll place their business cards in the jar and put some coins in with a letter and then they sealed up the cornerstone. So we do plan to put a memorabilia box in the replica cornerstone to be opened by the employees of Arlington National cemetary. It is going to include the declaration of independence, copy of the constitution provided by the national archives, there will be identification bags, a platoon will show their horsemens badge, the Arlington Ladies will provide a letter, basically we want all of those who have a hand in Arlington National cemetery. We are inactive cemetery so on everyone who plays part not to have a role in this new memorabilia box. Our new box or time capsule will be slightly different materials, we will go with something that represents our time. We are going with a stainless steel manufactured box instead of soldering it close it will have a sealed gasket and be bolted closed. We also have some modern decoration. This box had a bronze plaque on top, we are going to have laser engraving on the top of our lid with this seal and the year to be opened. We are going to use slightly different technology, hopefully to try and keep the condition of airbox supported for the objects, so we are going to try to get the temperature and humidity rates and make sure it dries out the environment, try to remove some of the oxygen, put some absorbers in there, we may even flush out some of the oxygen had, we are going to also rapper objects like they did for the original memorabilia box, but ours are going to be a little bit more modern. Crow xin inhibitors, some separation between our objects. So similar ideas but more modern materials. I think a lot of the objects place in the memorabilia box are not necessarily unique are high value. They were what the members of the committee felt represented their time best, so theres no secret treasure in the box, but i think what it shows is how people felt about themselves at the time, but they wanted to be remembered for, that they felt like they are part of something important. And that is the same urge we feel today, to throw together something that represents us. Coming up on American History tv we visit Congress Hall at the Independence National historical park in philadelphia. Congress hall was home to congress from 1790 to 1800 when philadelphia served as the temporary capital of the United States. Weeknights this month were featuring American History tv programs of a preview of whats available every weekend on cspan 3. Tonight, you begin with womens history, the National WorldWar One Museum and memorial memorial hosted mona to talk about her book piece on our terms, the global battle for womens rights after the first world war. The Sacramento State history professor argues that a Diverse Group of women from around the world pushed for more rights in the wake of world war i. And that some of these women who are attending the 1919 to 1920 paris peace conference helped push president Woodrow Wilson to support the 19th amendment. Watch beginning at eight eastern, and enjoy American History tv every weekend on cspan 3. Each week American History tv american artifacts visits museums and historic places, and up next, we travel to philadelphias Independence National historical park, to learn about Congress Hall, the Meeting Place of the u. S. House and senate between 1790 and