‘We just keep on’: Dade mayor unveils decades-old time capsule celebrating women’s success

Miami-Dade leaders and community members lined up in front of a patch of grass and glanced at a rusted barrel swinging from an excavator. The barrel was a time capsule buried by female leaders more than three decades ago. And it was unveiled Wednesday during Women’s History Month by the first woman to serve as Miami-Dade mayor — Daniella Levine Cava.

The time capsule, which contained hundreds of items honoring the work and accomplishments of local women, was buried in 1992 at The Women’s Park. The Fontainebleau site is the first park dedicated to women in the country. It was supposed to be exhumed on Aug. 26, 2020, to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote but was pushed back due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It’s just a great way to look at our past and look at some of the milestones that were achieved at that time and maybe some of the wishes for the future,”

Levine Cava said.

The collection of more than 300 documents, photographs and artifacts — including works by Marjory Stoneman Douglas and Cuban anthropologist Lydia Cabrera and greetings from then-first lady Barbara

Bush — will be on display at the Roxcy O’Neal Bolton Women’s History Gallery, named after one of the park’s founders. O’Neal Bolton was a feminist and civil-rights activist.

Though many of the women who contributed to the capsule have passed away, several — including Silvia Unzueta, an advocate and one of the park’s founding members — were at the Wednesday ceremony. Levine Cava shouted out Pat Seitz, the first female president of the Florida Bar, calling Seitz an inspiration in her early days practicing law.

“Who knows 30 years from now what will girls and women be doing?” Levine Cava said. “They’ll be doing everything. There’ll be absolutely no barriers for what people can achieve just based on their ambition, their strength, their persistence.”

Levine Cava told the Miami Herald it’s “pretty

sweet” to be the county’s first female mayor but added that many girls today know they can be the first female president.

“Certainly, [there’s] many, many more glass ceilings to be broken and we just keep on,” she told the Miami Herald. “It also reminds us it’s not just about women. It’s about all people who are held back or who don’t have the same opportunities.”

Dorothy Jenkins Fields, who founded the park as well as Miami’s Black Archives, History & Research Foundation of South Florida, said she was glad the artifacts — many of which she donated — will be on display.

Fields, however, said more needs to be done to dismantle the mind-set that women aren’t equal.

“We’ve come a long way,

but we’re still a long way to go,” she said.

SOME OF THE PARK’S OTHER FOUNDERS

Molly Turner: Florida’s

● first female TV reporter was also a WPLG-ABC 10 anchor and Emmy winner.

Leona F. Cooper: The

●

activist founded the St. Martin de Porres Association, a lay group for Black Catholics in the Archdiocese of Miami

Katherine Fernandez

●

Rundle: The first female Hispanic state attorney in Florida

Elaine Gordon: The

●

first woman elected to be Florida’s speaker pro-tempore was a state representative from 1972 to 1994.

ALIE SKOWRONSKI askowronski@miamiherald.com Silvia Unzueta, left, a Women’s Park founder, kisses Freda Tschumy, the artist who designed the time capsule, during the unveiling of its contents, pictured behind them, on Wednesday at The Women’s Park in Miami.

ALIE SKOWRONSKI askowronski@miamiherald.com Dade Mayor Daniella Levine-Cava points to Judge Mattie Belle Davis’ gavel, left, which was in the capsule. Belle was the first woman elected to the American Bar Foundation.

ALIE SKOWRONSKI askowronski@miamiherald.com Bonnie Bolton, whose mother, Roxcy, was a Women’s Park founder, looks at a key of Sweetwater and other contents from the time capsule.