Staff and community members joined Caryn A. Schwab, far right, to celebrate the creation of a new time capsule that was placed inside a cornerstone from 1895. The time capsule now rests in a lobby wall in the Mount Sinai Queens Pavilion.
What mementos would you place in a 2017 time capsule that might not be opened for 100 years or more? When that question was posed to employees from Mount Sinai Queens and residents of western Queens through social media almost a year ago, the responses included a variety of items: copies of the weekly Queens Gazette newspaper and The New York Times, a New York City MetroCard, trailers of 2017 Oscar-nominated movies, an iPhone, the soundtrack from the popular musical Hamilton, and an issue of Inside Mount Sinai that highlighted the hospital’s building expansion project.
In September, Caryn A. Schwab, Executive Director of Mount Sinai Queens, together with a small group of employees and community members, placed these items and other historical keepsakes into the wall of the new Mount Sinai Queens Pavilion lobby. The Pavilion is a modern, light-filled, state-of-the-art ambulatory medical facility on the hospital’s Astoria campus.
A cornerstone marked “1895” that was preserved from the old building that once stood on the site of the new Queens Pavilion served as their time capsule. When construction workers were demolishing the old building in 2013, they removed the cornerstone. Inside they found keepsakes from 1929 that had been placed there by John Daly, MD, who ran an inpatient hospital known as Daly’s Astoria Sanatorium on the site at the time.
A closer look at the cornerstone from 1895
Although construction of the old building was completed in 1895, Dr. Daly renovated the building in 1929. At that time, he and his colleagues placed a bible and a copy of The New York Telegram, dated January 21, 1929, into the same cornerstone. Front page news of the day announced “President-elect” Herbert Hoover’s trip south and concern by physicians in London over King George V’s “mental state.” Another story about trading on Wall Street provided no indication of the Great Depression that would follow later that year.
Inside the 2017 time capsule, Ms. Schwab placed the items from 1929, the new items, and a letter on Mount Sinai Queens stationery that was addressed to “Dear Friends in the Future,” in which she provided a short background about the hospital and explained why the latest keepsakes were chosen.
“This capsule represents hope, determination, and good will for the future,” Ms. Schwab wrote. “We cherish our history as we look ahead with excitement to the future. These are uncertain times in health care and our world, but we are optimistic in our ability to keep improving health care for the Borough of Queens and beyond.”
The bible and newspaper uncovered from the first time capsule.
