- Foot-square box was found in a statue’s base earlier this year.
- Officials believe it was placed in 1829, when R.E. Lee was a prominent cadet at the academy.
- They have no idea what is in the capsule; high-powered X-rays have been inconclusive.
- The box has been nearly 200 years in the base of a statue to Polish general Thaddeus Kosciuszko, who helped the colonies win their independence from Britain.
Watch the opening of the time capsule here live at 10:30 a.m. Monday, Aug. 28.
WEST POINT − No one knows what’s inside a lead box discovered this spring inside a monument dedicated to Revolutionary War patriot Thaddeus Kosciuszko, but that’s about to change.
A history mystery nearly 200 years in the making will be solved Monday during a livestream event at the United States Military Academy when the box will be opened. It is believed to be a time capsule from 1829, the year a cadet from Virginia named Robert E. Lee graduated from West Point.
In late May, crews were disassembling the cracking base of the monument to Kosciuszko when they discovered the box and concluded it was a time capsule placed there by cadets.
This being the military academy, the post’s archaeologist was called and took custody of the box, which measures one cubic foot. He documented and photographed the artifact. Within weeks, a member of the academy’s department of physics and nuclear engineering trained a high-powered X-ray device on the box, but could not get any conclusive results about the contents because the box is made of lead.
That led to a decision to reveal the box’s contents live on West Point’s YouTube page, in a ceremony at 10:30 a.m. in Robinson Auditorium at the academy’s Thayer Hall.
The event could be a spectacular boon or a bust akin to the live television broadcast on April 21, 1986, of Geraldo Rivera opening Al Capone’s secret vault. Before a live audience of 30 million viewers, Rivera discovered it held nothing but dust and debris.
It has also led to all sorts of speculation: What could…
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