LIVERMORE --- Eureka! Maybe.

As sonar and high-powered metal detectors tried in vain to find Livermore's lost Centennial Time Capsule this week, it seems bureaucratic detective work may solve the case of the disappearing relic after all,

Nine days before the Alameda County Fair opens, Livermore's time capsule display there is half-empty.

Inside a glass cabinet next to the Millennium Time Capsule, a stainless steel drum used to dispose of nuclear warheads, Is a display of its contents: Mayor Cathie Brown's cell phone and a pair of "Star Wars" tickets.

But next to that, a sign at the exhibit reads, "This space reserved for Livermore's Centennial Time Capsule, when found."

That may be as early as 11:30 a.m. today, when city officials will try to unearth it from Centennial Park for a third time in as many weeks.

City Clerk Alice Calvert has found a May 6, 1974, document from Park and Tree Superinten. dent Daniel V. Freitas Jr. to his boss confirming, "The time capsule was sealed and buried as you requested."

The document says it's near the park's totem pole and lists its contents: everything from beer steins and chardonnay to bumper stickers and balloons. It may lead to the capsule that technology failed to find.

Thursday, Douglas Crice was at Centennial Park with a sonar device that resembled a lawnmower. His Saratoga company, GeoRadar Inc., is based on spinoff technology from the Department of Energy..

He said it works exactly like a commercial fish-finder, by beaming sound waves into the ground and recording the echoes. The device is an improvement on metal detectors because it can find anything underground that differs from its surroundings.

"It's great for finding bodies," Crice said.

All Crice got on a digital screen Thursday was four blobs from something two feet below the park turf.

On Wednesday, Bob Howard was at the park with a TM-808 metal detector with two 15-inch magnum force loops. The TM808 can trace metal objects 20 feet underground.

Howard. who owns a metaldetector store 10 blocks away called Prospector's Claim, says he's been at Centennial Park 10 times this month. He often spends two or three hours at a time trying to find the elusive metal canister, trying out all manner of metal detector.

The $650 device is the Mother of All Metal Detectors. He once used it to find a box of silver coins buried eight feet deep. But no Centennial Time Capsule.

"If it would have been there, this machine would have found it," Howard said.

The only squeal he got was in the corner of the park, about 100 feet from the totem pole where city groundskeepers dug several well-publicized holes earlier this month.

Livermore's ill-fated time capsule has captured the attention of the country. Dan Rather narrated a two-minute piece on CBS Evening News on June 11 about what he called a "history mystery."

Ever since, Centennial Time Capsule organizer Barry Schrader has been getting calls from throughout the country, including a suggestion that he bring in a psychic.

"I think we'll pass on the psychic," said Schrader, a spokesman for Sandia National Laboratories, who said he'd prefer to stay away from para-science.

CrIce can't figure out why the capsule is so newsworthy.

"I guess It's news because Livermore has the smartest people in the world, and they can't find a metal box in a city park," he ventured.

Old news hounds like Rather would say the Story has legs. Seems the Centennial Time Capsule does, too.

April 2, 2000