On Saturday 25 October 1997 one of my sons and I travelled to a cemetery for the exposure phase of the experiment. I chose a cemetery because I felt it would remain in its current state for longer than most other areas (demolitions, re-zoning, re-building, etc., is probably less likely in a cemetery than in most other areas). This, I thought might be important if a time seer of the future needed to be near the location where the event under examination took place.
Photo 3. The grave chosen for exposing the string.
After finding a grave with a suitable slab and headstone, that was open to the sky (you never know, I thought, this might be important if an unobscured bird's eye view of the site was necessary by time seers of the future), we began the procedure that would expose the string. The selected grave is shown in Photo 3.
Firstly, I removed the tape holding the code sheet covers closed. I then knelt behind the headstone with my eyes closed and the code sheet in my hand. I next reached around the headstone, opened the covers of the code sheet, and rested it on the slab - the string now being exposed to the sky (see Photo 4). I then turned away and walked to my son who was about 8 metres behind the headstone. We sat together for the exposure period, not able to see the written string.
Photo 4. Kneeling behind the headstone to expose the string.
The grave we chose - purely because of its location and dimensions - happened to be that of two men, Alfred Kelly and Alfred William Kelly (father and son?).
We waited for 40 minutes before I again approached the headstone, reached around it, and closed the code sheet covers without seeing the contents. I then sealed the code sheet with adhesive tape.
The string on the code sheet was exposed on top of the headstone at 1600hrs EST (Australia) on Saturday 25 October 1997, and closed at 1640hrs EST the same day. The geographic location of the code sheet in terms of latitude and longitude, within the accuracy limits of the Garmin GPS 45XL that was used, was: Lat. S 23° 08.287' and Lon. 150° 44.545'.
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