A half-century ago, two University of Colorado students found the battered body of a young woman in Boulder Creek. As days turned into weeks, the few clues available to investigators led only to blind alleys.

"If there's a next move, I wish I knew it," Sheriff Art Everson told the Rocky Mountain News a week after the body was discovered.

Authorities have never come close to identifying the woman.

Now the sheriff's office has tentatively scheduled a news conference for next week to discuss the possibility of taking another look at the case.

Lt. Phil West, spokesman for the sheriff's office, would not comment on what is prompting new interest. He would only say that the agency is "considering" further investigation.

However, local historian Silvia Pettem said she raised the possibility of exhuming the body with Sheriff Joe Pelle in September. With modern DNA testing, authorities might be able to at last identify the woman, Pettem says.

"My theory is, maybe today, with the Internet and television, somebody might step forward and say, "I never knew what happened to my sister," said Pettem, the author of 10 books on Boulder history and a local columnist.

Pettem said the case stands out from other unsolved crimes because the community took such an interest in the victim. Residents took up a collection to bury her under a headstone at historic Columbia Cemetery, instead of in a pauper's grave.

"It was a pulling together of the community," she said. "It's the only case I know of in which there was all this outpouring of the community at the time."

Pettem said Pelle was open to the idea of reopening the case, but only if funds for the exhumation are raised privately.

The Boulder History Museum will accept contributions for the project, Director Nancy Geyer said. "It could make a very interesting story on a piece of history," Geyer said.

The cost is not known.

The woman's nude body was found April 8, 1954, near Boulder Falls, a popular tourist spot about nine miles up Boulder Canyon.

The woman was between 17 and 20 years old. She was 5 feet 2 inches tall with reddish blond hair.

The two CU students, both 19, were taking pictures and collecting driftwood along the creek when they saw the body.

"It didn't look very lifelike, but we didn't exactly feel easy about writing it off as a mannequin. So we thought we better go down and find out," James Andes, one of the students said at the time.

When they realized what it was, the pair raced back to Boulder and called the sheriff.

"It was a funny feeling," Wayne Swanson, the other student, told reporters shortly after the find. "We weren't exactly scared in the sense we wanted to run. But I sure wish that we hadn't found that body."

Pathologist F.L. James concluded the woman was still breathing when she was hurled down a 29-foot embankment into the creek. She had a fractured skull, a fractured jaw and numerous bruises.

The woman had been dead about a week before the students discovered her, James said. By that time, animals had gnawed the body. All the fingerprints were gone except the fragment of one.

Neither her clothing nor other evidence were found, despite an extensive search of the area. Everson concluded she was killed elsewhere, then dumped.

The only identifying signs were a set of perfect teeth, not one filling or cavity, and an appendectomy scar. The sheriff's office attempted to match the body to missing persons reports circulating at the time, without success.

A man was arrested in Oklahoma two days later driving a car with bloodstains on the back seat, as well as a ribbon bearing traces of blond hair.

A few days later, he confessed to killing the owner of the car, not the woman.

The Rev. Paul Fife of Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church led the funeral service.

Boulder residents contributed eight floral pieces. The woman was buried April 22. The small headstone reads, "Jane Doe, April 1954. Age about 20 years."