150-year-old time capsule found in wall of oldest synagogue in Manchester

Glass jar containing newspapers, synagogue documents and coins extracted from Spanish shul that’s now the English city’s Jewish Museum

By Cnaan Liphshiz 25 September 2020, 11:04 pm

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Cnaan Liphshiz was a Jewish World reporter at The Times of Israel

The time capsule extracted from a wall during renovations at what used to be a synagogue in Manchester, UK. (Courtesy of the Jewish Museum of Manchester via JTA)

JTA — Construction workers at the site of a former Spanish and Portuguese synagogue in the English city of Manchester found a time capsule from the 1870s.

The glass jar was extracted recently from a wall of what is now the Manchester Jewish Museum, The Guardian reported Thursday.

It contains newspapers, synagogue documents and a handful of coins and will go on display as part of the museum’s permanent collection chronicling the lives of Manchester Jews through the ages.

The building was erected in 1874 and is now closed for a major renovation project, according to the Jewish Chronicle of London. It’s also the oldest surviving shul building in Manchester.

The museum is expected to reopen next spring thanks to a subsidy of about $3 million from the UK national lottery.