Australian historians are building a 2020 time capsule — this is what’s in it

When a koala which had been hanging on the Brooklyn Bridge arrived in a FedEx box for Libby Stewart in Canberra, she refused to touch it.

The then-senior curator at the National Museum of Australia (NMA) had arranged for the plush toy, which had been left on the New York City icon, to be sent Down Under.

A tag hanging from its foot read: “One billion of the world’s unique wildlife has died in the Australian bushfire.”

Ms Stewart had wanted to acquire the item, ever since the global campaign appeared on Instagram, for the NMA’s bushfire collection but there wasn’t a clear consensus on how long COVID-19 could survive on flat surfaces.

“It just sat there for a while,” she said.

“It would have been long past the period when it might have been…