Spilyay tymoo., March 02, 2006, Page Page 8, Image 8

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Page 8
March 2
Spilyay Tymoo
Cultural site:
considered
sacred
(Continued from page 1)
In a Jan. 30 letter addressed
to the Walkers, G riffin said he
had determ ined that the site,
which he called the D ry River
Gorge at Horse Ridge, is eligible
for listing on the national regis­
ter.
The area has the potential o f
yielding “significant inform a­
tion” on the importance o f the
area to the Paiute people, G rif­
fin wrote.
G riffin’s endorsement is im­
portant, because the nine-mem­
ber State Advisory Committee
on Historic Preservation must
approve the nomination before
the site can be reviewed by the
National Park Service for list­
ing on the national register, said
D avid Bogan, spokesman for
the Heritage Conservation D i­
v isio n o f the O reg o n State
Parks and Recreation D epart­
ment.
It’s unclear how long that
process will take.
Deschutes County commis­
sioners plan to vote on whether
to permit the mine at an upcom­
ing meeting.
The Walker property has also
been the subject o f another lo­
cal effort to protect the site.
On Jan. 26, the landmarks
commission unanimously rec­
ommended that the Deschutes
County Commission add five
acres o f the p a rcel to the
county’s inventory o f historic
and cultural resources.
I f com m issioners approve
the recommendation, the addi­
tion could make county planners
“more likely to carefully con­
sider adverse im pacts” from
surrounding land uses, accord­
ing to a report authored by Pat
Kliewer, cultural and historic
planner who works for the city
of Bend.
Of 1,734 surveyed archaeo­
logical sites in Deschutes
County, the Walker site - which
contains more than 200 picto-
graphs, or rock paintings - has
been determined most signifi­
cant by archaeologists and the
University of Oregon’s archae­
ology department, Kliewer’s re­
port states.
The site is significant not only
for its history. Tribes that con­
sider the site sacred and cur­
rently visit include the Confed­
erated Tribes of the Warm
Springs Reservation, the Burns
Paiutes, the Northern Paiutes
and the Klamath Tribes, the re­
port says.
“This is more than a place
that is just an oddity or a place
where there are old things,”
Kliewer said. “This is part of
ongoing culture.”
American Indian visitors
have migrated across what is
now the Walker property for
millennia, according to the Land­
marks Commission report.
Water, game animals and a
nearby supply of obsidian,
which was used to make tools,
drew tribes from British Colum­
bia, Washington, Idaho and the
Columbia River Gorge from the
north, while Klamath tribes vis­
ited from the south.
The Walker ranch was part
of an 1,800-acre ranch estab­
lished by George Millican in
1870. Other homesteaders fol­
lowed, and by 1915 there were
60 homesteads and 500 acres
of rye and wheat crops being
cultivated in the Millican Valley,
according to the report.
But a drought that hit around
the same time as the 1918 Span­
ish influenza epidemic halted
growth in the community. Lum­
ber mills that opened in Bend
around the same time drew set­
T
V
tlers away, leaving only cows and
a few ranchers.
Since the rock mine was pro­
posed in the area last year, tribes
have weighed in on the signifi­
cance of the site.
“This area is one of very few
left that has such special mean­
ing to us as a connection to our
past, present and future,” wrote
Perry Chocktoot, a cultural re­
source protection specialist for
the Klamath Tribes. “It would
be a tragedy to lose another sa­
cred area to the so-called
progress of America.”
The Burns Paiutes have a
connection to the site as well,
said Minerva Teeman Soucie, a
tribal elder who wrote urging
Deschutes County to protect
the area.
“This is a sacred area and we
should do all we can to protect
it from damage,” Soucie wrote.
“This is one of the treasures of
the area and I feel that one day,
someone will come in on an all-
terrain vehicle and cart the rock
art away.”
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