One of the many things that we’ve come to learn while living in Mississippi is that it doesn’t have to the Halloween season in order for something spooky to happen here. Researchers working hard at the University of Mississippi Medical Center reported a shocking discovery this week that sent a chill running down our spines. With an outward appearance that looks as ordinary as ever, you’d never guess that this school was sitting on top of a mass grave site.

The discovery of remains underneath the University of Mississippi Medical Center's grounds isn't anything new. Back in 2014, 2,000 coffins were uncovered here.
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But now researchers have made their biggest discovery ever, uncovering roughly 7,000 new graves underneath the surface using ground-penetrating radar.
University of Mississippi Medical Center/Facebook

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Before the medical center became what it is today, the property served as the Mississippi State Lunatic Asylum until the mid-1930s.
University of Mississippi Medical Center/Facebook
During its years of operation the asylum institutionalized over 30,000 people, leaving the possibility for many more graves to be uncovered.
Adam Greig/Flickr
Now researchers have hopes of creating a genealogy research facility, memorial and visitors center at the medical center that would be unlike anything that we've ever seen before.
University of Mississippi Medical Center/Facebook
Since the 1990s, discoveries of graves have been made here. But as years have gone by, technology has advanced and more construction has taken place on the grounds, uncovering more and more remains. The University frequently receives inquiries from those who had relatives in the Asylum, wondering how they can reconnect with their family member's remains. When the land was operating as an Asylum, it acquired such a large cemetery over the years because patients' bodies frequently went unclaimed.

While researchers working at the University's anthropology department hope to do something worthwhile with the remains, exhuming the enormous cemetery that was lost with time is an expensive task to say the least. A unique piece of our state's history that's hiding in plain sight, we're often left wondering just how many more graves will be discovered here.

Did you have any family members that were at the state’s Asylum? If you didn’t already know about what was hiding underneath this University, share your reactions with us in our comments section!

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