Nightclub's 1985 Time Capsule Causes Evacuation in NYC

Back in 1985, the staff of famous New York City nightclub Danceteria (which was featured in Madonna's Desperately Seeking Susan, per CBS New York) buried a time capsule that looked like a WWII bomb. "I kind of mentioned it as a joke back then," the former owner of the discotheque tells the New York Daily News. "Someone’s going to dig this up and think it's an unexploded bomb." He says he bought the faux missile, which he describes to Gothamist as a "green, empty practice bomb," at an Army Navy store for $200. His prediction came to pass Wednesday, when the time capsule was unearthed while construction site workers were digging for a foundation. (Danceteria closed in 1986.) Police were called to the scene.

"We first saw the police," says a worker from a nearby site. "They were screaming and everything, so I said 'What's going on?' I was on my lunch break. I looked out the window and they started telling people they had to get out, and they started evacuating all the buildings." Pedestrians were told to stay away from the cordoned-off area, but a bomb squad arrived and quickly determined the metal "missile" was just a prop. Inside were letters from the Danceteria staff. The club's former owner is a little upset about how it all went down: He tells Gothamist, "They weren't supposed to open it for 10,000 years!" (More strange stuff stories.)