It was 100 years ago when the Garrettsville Women’s Study Group planted a time capsule at the base of the monument in front of the old Opera House. The time has come to open that time capsule and the James A. Garfield Historical Society will hold a ceremony on Saturday open the capsule to discover what their ancestors left behind.
“It is an exciting moment,” Co-Director of the Time Capsule Team Denise Ellerhorst told The Weekly Villager on July 2. We need to find out what they felt like was significant 100 years ago that they would want us to see now. We have no idea what is inside of the capsule and we are all excited to see what happened 100 years ago that was significant enough to put it in the time capsule.”
In addition to opening the time capsule, the JAG Historical Society will continuously stream throughout the day on big-screen televisions oral histories of 30 residents from Garrettsville. They also will offer historical tours, hold a beard contest and provide entertainment in the form of piano music.
The ceremony will not only be open to Garrettsville residents but also to anyone in or outside the State of Ohio with a connection to the history of Garrettsville. Ellerhorst said that people from across the country will be in attendance including traveling from California.
The JAG Historical Society has been awarded two grants to pay for the expenses of this event with an AM250 grant of $3,000 and a $3,900 grant from the Village of Hiram. The Historical Society has also received donations from residents to assist in paying for the expenses.
“We were totally shocked and so very happy because as you know writing a grant is a lot of hard work and we had help from Sandy Kreisman, who has written grants in the past and she guided us a lot,” Ellerhorst said.
The grants are only to be used to pay for expenses of the event with most of the expenses being incurred to pay for new brass plaques installed on the base of the monument, planting a new tree in the cemetery on Maple Avenue with the addition of another plaque commemorating the planting of the tree and purchasing a new time capsule that will be planted in September.
Ellerhorst added that any funds not used will be returned to the respective organizations.
The Women’s Study Group was a group of civic-minded women who made significant contributions to the community. According to Ellerhorst, the group put street signs up, planted flower beds around town, cleaned up Silver Creek to plant flowers there and helped with scholarships for students. At the time when they planted the time capsule, it had only been 50 years since Garrettsville had been incorporated as a Village in the State of Ohio.
She acknowledged that even in an era when women’s rights were not fully recognized, the Village of Garrettsville was ahead of its time.
“It seems like the women did a lot of good things in town,” she noted. “I feel like Garrettsville does always band together in a community and help each other out. We look out for each other and have great services in our town.”
Although it is still to be determined just what the Women’s Study Group left behind for the future of Garrettsville to see, Ellerhorst was confident that the Village’s ancestors were as community-minded as the residents are today.
“We will find out how different life was back then when we compare it to now when it is opened, but I think we will find it is the same loving good community to raise a family in and just a friendly hometown feel,” she said.
After the JAG Historical Society opens the time capsule, they will start making plans to plant a new time capsule in a few more months. In order to do so, they have enlisted the help of students who have been invited to write a letter and include a black-and-white photograph of themselves and their families. Ellerhorst said the Historical Society is still taking suggestions on what else to add to the new time capsule.
“It is so exciting,” Ellerhorst said. “We have involved the schools and they have been having students write letters and we have had the Historical Society be open and have anyone come in who would like to write a letter that they would like left in the time capsule for future generations to see.”
