An intact skeleton that could date to the 1800s was found by a contractor digging a small trench at New Hartford High School in New Hartford, N.Y., on Monday night, New Hartford police chief Raymond Philo said.

Forensic experts are currently exhuming the skeleton, after which it will be taken to a Utica College lab and tested.

Philo said the tests could reveal a lot of information on the skeleton, such as the race of the person and the possible cause of death. Arrangements will then be made for a burial elsewhere through the Presbyterian Church.

The high school was built on top of a former cemetery where bodies were buried throughout most of the 19th century. When the high school was built there 277 graves were exhumed, but during that period it was common for poor people to be buried in a cemetery unaccounted for, Philo said.

The contractor was doing some work at the school for the $25.7 million Triple A Capital Project, which was passed by voters in March 2007 and includes complete renovations to the Oxford Road campus auditorium, an outdoor multipurpose athletic field, a new math science and technology wing for the high school and a new musical wing for the high school.

Observer-Dispatch