News from Indian Country
Pgge 6
Spilyay Tyrooo
May 21, 2009
Plea entered in artifact case
ABERDEEN, S.D. (AP) - A
Selby man pleaded guilty last
week to excavating and traffick
ing American Indian artifacts
found along the Missouri River.
Brian E. Ekrem faces up to
two years in federal prison and
a $250,000 fine at his sentenc
ing in August.
The 28-year-old Ekrem ad
mitted that he sold, bought and
exchanged artifacts or offered to
do so.
They included beads, stone
points, knives and blades, bone
tools,, cannonballs, copper
bracelets and pottery.
He's one of five men indicted
in a federal case. Two others also
have pleaded guilty.
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Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs Tribal Council Chairman Ron Suppah, and
Joeinne Caldwell, Port of Cascade Locks commissioner, sign an option agreement for
property at the tribes’ proposed casino site at Cascade Locks.
The agreement, signed last week, gives the tribes the option to purchase the 25-acre
casino site, plus surrounding acreage for parking. The tribes would exercise the
option if the casino proposal is approved by the Department of the Interior.
Committee backs EchoHawk for BIA job
BOISE, Idaho (AP) - A
U.S. Senate Committee has
given the nod to making
Larry EchoHawk the next
head o f the Bureau o f In
dian Affairs.
E choH aw k, a fo rm er
Idaho Attorney General and
gubernatorial candidate, was
nominated to be the next
Assistant Secretary for In
dian Affairs by President Barack
Obama last month.
T he nom ination was ap
proved by a voice vote Thurs
day by the Senate Select Com
mittee on Indian Affairs and
now goes to the full Senate for
consideration.
The nomination also has the
support o f Sen. Mike Crapo.
T he Idaho Republican says
E choH aw k has a diverse
background and experience
that make him a qualified
candidate for the job.
EchoHawk, a member of
the Pawnee tribe and law
professor at Brigham Young
University, served as Idaho's
Attorney General from 1991
through 1995.
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Collection of Native crafts donated
MOCLIPS, Wash. (AP) -
A stout, cylindrical basket of
cedar bark and bear grass sits
in a glass display case in the
Ocean Crest Resort lounge.
It has intricate, tightly-woven
patterns: a black canoe sil
houette, purple birds and a
thin border o f geom etric
shapes around the rim. The
Quinault basket is one o f
about two dozen on display
at the resort.
The baskets were recendy
donated to the Museum of
the N orth Beach by Barbara
Topete, founder of the Ocean
Crest Resort. Her donation in
cludes baskets, dolls and
beadwork. The majority o f her
collection is m ade up o f
Quinault baskets, but it contains
pieces from all over Washington
and Canada.
“I just feel it's beautiful work
manship and it's a practice that
very little is being done now,”
said Topete, who is 89. “They're
som ething th a t should be
shared.”
A handful are on display
at the resort and the museum,
but most are in storage, be
cause the museum neither
has the room nor the proper
cases to show the collection
and keep it. from deteriorat
ing.
The museum is planning
on moving into a replica of
the Northern Pacific Railroad
depot that served as a center
of commerce in Moclips un
til it was torn down in the
1950s.
Study looks at early use of Navajo smoke signals
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A L B U Q U E R Q U E , N.M. long distance and questionable while,” he said.
(AP) — A rm ed w ith special views,” Copeland said. “A lot of
Tree ring dating shows most
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flares, archaeologists and a team them are kind of no-brainers. of the sites are from the early
o f volunteers are fanning out You can pretty much see from 1700s, said Patrick Hogan, as
over part o f the Four Corners A to B, but A to C was sort of sociate director of the Univer
region to send out smoke sig questionable and that's the kind sity of New Mexico's Office of
nals as part of an experiment o f thing we want to test.”
Contract Archaeology.
designed to learn more about
The volunteers planned to
how early Navajos may have head out to some of the remote
defended their territory.
defensive sites on Saturday.
There are more than 200 Their mission: G et there by
puebhtos — usually high on rock noon, set off their smoke sig-'
outcroppings overlooking the nals and scan the horizon for
San Juan Basin — that archaeolo other columns o f smoke.
gists believe were built by Na
Much of the area where New
vajos three centuries ago to pro Mexico, Arizona, Colorado and
tect themselves from Spanish Utah meet is known as Dinetah,
explorers and neighboring the ancestral homeland of the
tribes.
Navajos. The tribe's traditional
The sites feature the remains creation story centers on the
of what were once formidable area.
structures made o f stacked
“The Dinetah essentially is
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sandstone. The theory is that the emergence place o f the Na
Navajos bunkered down inside vajo,” said Ron Maldonado, pro
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the pueblitos and possibly used gram manager o f the Navajo
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smoke to signal to other sites, Nation Historic Preservation
said Jim Copeland, an archae Department.
ologist with the Bureau o f Land
He said Navajo ancestors
Management in Farmington.
spread out from here to occupy
Copeland said previous ex much o f the Four Corners re
periments in the early 1990s gion. Because o f pressure from
AHMijar
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verified the general concept, but the Spanish and other tribes, he
scores of new sites have been said they retreated to Dinetah
identified since then and im and built defensive structures.
proved computer modeling and
“If you hear an enemy ap
analysis has refined the idea of proaching, you climb into these
an “early warning system.”
things and pull up the ladder and
“We're still trying to confirm you can seal yourself in for a
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