History to come full Cercle
The Cercle Laurier Club plans to bury time capsule for 25 years as reminder of club’s, city’s heritage
WOONSOCKET – There’s a snug 214 cubic inches of space inside the shiny metal tube, but members of the Cercle Laurier Club intend to squeeze as many memories into it as possible – maybe some of yours.
And then they’re going to bury them in the ground.
No, members of one of the city’s largest Franco-American civic clubs aren’t erasing history. They’re saving it in a time capsule for a future generation of club members to discover – a quarter of a century from now.
“We hope we’ll be here when that day comes,” says Gary Lapierre, a life member who came up with the idea. “If not, our grandchildren will be here.”
The time capsule will be ceremoniously interred on the grounds of the 165 East School St. club on Oct. 15, at 2 p.m. Mayor Lisa Baldelli-Hunt, U.S. Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI) and members
of the city’s legislative delegation – most of whom are members of the club – have been invited and some are expected to offer a few parting words for the silvery cylinder.
Lapierre wasn’t quite sure what he was getting into when he decided to manage the time capsule project. He wanted to be sure that whatever club members plant in the ground will be moisture-protected so the contents won’t be a pile of mush when they’re excavated in 25 years.
He found out there isn’t a big inventory of bona fide time capsules on the market, but he managed to locate one on ebay for $80. The metal cylinder is made from corrosion-resistant stainless steel with an end cap affixed by screws.
It’s basically a sealed pipe, 4 inches in diameter and 17 inches long.
Lapierre says 95 percent of the material destined for the metal package will be club memorabilia, including hundreds of photographs stored in miniature as digital information. He says there’s no way to know for sure what kinds of technology folks will be using in 2042 to view digital images, but he thinks it’s a safe bet that compact discs will still be viable, so he stored the images on one of those. Just to be on the safe side, he double-packed the images onto a zip drive.
Other material destined for the subterranean storage vessel include items more emblematic of municipal and civic culture, including an Autumnfest raffle button. With help form the Autumnfest Steering Committee, Lapierre managed to rustle up Autumnfest button No. 2042 to match the year of the capsule’s unearthing.
“I don’t know if Autumnfest is going to be around in 2042,” says Lapierre. “I certainly hope it is.”
Another thing that will be in the time capsule is a copy of this story. It’s all part of the club’s long-range plan for the celebratory liberation of the capsule from its temporary tomb, exactly 25 years from when it will be buried, on Oct. 15, 2042, according to Lapierre.
But the veteran club member says there are still a few cubic inches of space left in the memory tube for things that the denizens of 2042 Woonsocket might find interesting, shocking or amusing about their forebears from nearly three decades earlier. Anyone with suggestions or a possible offering is encouraged to contact Lapierre at 230-9880.
I’m trying to spice it up a little, so it’s not just stuff from the Cercle Laurier Club and the city,” says Lapierre. “I’ll still be considering things to put in the capsule until maybe the day before it goes in the ground.”
Although the club’s roots go back to 1932, the reopening of the time capsule will nearly dovetail with the 100th anniversary of its christening as the Cercle Laurier.
Founded as the Paradis Athletic Club, the group was established by 11 men who used to gather to play checkers and cards in the basement of a house on Paradis Avenue, according to the official history of the organization, compiled in 1990 by club member Rene Lafayette, a former state representative from the city.
The club quickly outgrew its humble quarters and moved to a nearby convenience store on Welles Street with a new name – Le Club Canadien Francais. At the time, the reference to Canada was an important one for members, who sought to distinguish themselves from immigrants from France and French-speaking Belgians, all of whom were part of the complex weave of the social fabric at the time.
The club found a more lasting identity as the major political powers of the globe began to choose up sides for World War II. In January 1940, the organization’s leaders filed with the state the necessary papers to create the Cercle Laurier Club, a group that embraced a broader civic mission.
The name was chosen in honor of Sir Henri Charles Wilfrid Laurier. He was the seventh prime minister of Canada, but he was considered the first true FrenchCanadian to hold the office since the nation gained its independence from Great Britain in 1867. He served from 1896 to 1911 and is still revered as one of Canada’s greatest statesmen.
In 1953, the club built its first meeting hall at 187 Willow St., which remained the home of the Cercle Laurier for many years. The roof collapsed under the weight of 55 inches of snow in the infamous Blizzard of 1978, but club members rebuilt it – and expanded the hall – at the same time.
The new Cercle Laurier Club was built to last – or so it seemed. Fire destroyed the building in the 1990s, leaving the members in limbo until they secured the existing facility at 165 East School St. in 1996.
But the words Lafayette wrote about the Cercle Laurier in 1990 seem as timely now as they probably will when the time capsule is reopened.
“There is much more to the Cercle Laurier than wood and brick,” he said. “Name and address changes are historically interesting, but fail in and of themselves to really tell the story of this organization. The Cercle is a vibrant part of Woonsocket: mindful of its heritage, accommodating change, still as relevant today as it was 50 years ago.”
While the capsule will be jam-packed with artifacts from the club’s historical record, Lapierre says it’s much more than a repository of the past.
It’s an act of faith, an affirmative statement that the club plans on sticking around until 2042, and then some.
“We’re going to be here,” he says.