No guess came close to what was buried inside a Tindall Heights safe

A few dozen people gathered in a Macon-Bibb County Housing Authority parking lot Monday to find out the contents inside a safe found at the site of a former development.

Before it was opened, guesses ranged from the box being a time capsule to perhaps being empty.

Unlike Al Capone’s vault that was opened live on national TV in 1986 before 30 million people, there was something more than debris uncovered inside the rusted metal box buried on the former Tindall Heights grounds.

But not much.

The safe was found about 2 feet underground last week by a construction crew working on the redevelopment project there.

Several housing authority employees took turns in sweltering heat Monday afternoon using various tools to get the safe open. After 10 minutes of sweat and elbow grease, the door finally was knocked off thanks to a few thunderous blows from a sledgehammer.

But what was inside was anti-climatic for anyone predicting gold coins or memorabilia from many decades ago. Inside the safe were three coins, but instead of being gold plated, they were a standard United States dime from 1971 and two pennies.

The other contents?

An envelope bearing a dated Macon Housing Authority logo, a receipt from plumbing company Frank Irby Co. dated from 1992, and two tiny AT&T cassette tapes that appeared to be what is used for answering machines. There were also four keys, although what they opened were unknown Monday afternoon.

The Macon Housing authority envelope will have to be dried out before what was written inside on a document can be read. And an answering machine recorder will be needed to get the audio on the tape.

For Macon-Bibb County Housing Authority Executive Director June Parker the contents were not as remarkable as they could have been, but it was still worth the buildup. She mentioned beforehand that the box could contain something interesting or may have been bare.

The safe will likely be placed inside a future community center for the new multimillion housing development replacing the former Tindall Heights, Parker said.

“We were hoping, of course, that it was something more of a time capsule. I was hoping there could be money it,” she said with a laugh after the reveal. “But it’s still history and the excitement of being able to share with everyone something we found on the site that is old.”

Tindall Heights was torn down last year as part of a planned four-phase redevelopment project. The first phase features the Tindall Senior Towers.

The second phase will be the new Tindall Fields development of 64 family apartments. The proposed final two phases would include 130 multifamily units.

This story was originally published July 10, 2017 at 5:56 PM with the headline "No guess came close to what was buried inside a Tindall Heights safe."