In The Blink Of An Eye

Put that car back! Fifty years isn't that long a time!

TULSA, Okla. -- Hundreds watched today as a crane lifted a muddy package from a hole in the courthouse lawn: a 1957 Plymouth Belvedere buried to celebrate Oklahoma's 50 years of statehood.

The wrapped car -- a gold and white two-door hardtop -- appeared brown and red as it came out of the hole, but it was unclear whether the color represented dirt or rust. A bit of shiny chrome was visible on the bumper.

The car spent the last half-century covered in three layers of protective material and encased in a 12-by-20-foot concrete vault, supposedly tough enough to withstand a nuclear attack.

But event officials already had to pump out several feet of water from its crypt.

The car was placed on a flatbed truck so it could be unwrapped, spruced up and officially unveiled this evening at the Tulsa Convention Center. Spectators packed the streets to glimpse its journey.

Whether the car will start was unknown. Those who gathered to watch it being pulled out of the ground did not seem to care.

...Also buried with it were 10 gallons of gasoline -- in case internal combustion engines became obsolete by 2007 -- a case of beer, and the contents of a typical woman's handbag placed in the glove compartment: 14 bobby pins, a bottle of tranquilizers, a lipstick, a pack of gum, tissues, a pack of cigarettes, matches and $2.43.

There was also a spool of microfilm that recorded the entries of a contest to determine who would win the car: the person who guessed the closest of what Tulsa's population would be in 2007 -- 382,457 -- would win.

That person, or his or her heirs, will get the car and a $100 savings account, worth about $1,200 today with interest.