Smoke Signals
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Kennewick Man's origins could be revealed in September
The Interior Department must also reveal
in September whether it has been able to
culturally affiliate, or link, the bones to any
modern-day Tribe, which is key in deciding
who gets custody of Kennewick Man.
KENNEWICK, WA. (AP) In
July 1996, a pair of college students
searching for a good vantage point
from which to watch the annual hy
droplane races found instead a 9,000-year-old
skull in the shallows of the
Columbia River.
What at first appeared to be noth
ing more than a local law enforce
ment case of unidentified bones is
today a matter of international ar
chaeological interest.
Kennewick Man, it turns out, is one
of the oldest and most complete skel
etons found in North America. The
collection of 350 bones is stored at the
Burke Museum in Seattle while a
bitter custody dispute pends in U.S.
District Court in Portland, Oregon.
Kennewick Man "is very much a
world citizen by nature of the con
troversies that have swirled around
this case," says Stephanie Hanna, a
spokeswoman for the U.S. Depart
ment of the Interior in Washington,
D.C.
The controversies extend beyond
the issue of custody, to science vs.
Tribal tradition and scientists vs. the
federal government.
There have been allegations that
someone walked off with one of
Kennewick Man's leg bones.
The old bones at first were placed
in the custody of the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers, which has juris
diction over Columbia Park, where
Kennewick Man was found. The
corps, under the guidelines of the
1990 Native American Graves Pro
tection and Repatriation Act
(NAGPRA), made plans to return the
bones to a local Indian Tribe.
But eight prominent anthropolo
gists, including one from the
Smithsonian Institution, sued for the
right to study the bones.
A coalition of Northwest Indian
Tribes has sought custody of the
bones for immediate reburial, con
tending study of Kennewick Man
would be a desecration based on their
religious traditions. Just recently,
the Yakama Nation filed papers to
become part of the court case, seek
ing custody of the bones as well.
In September, the Interior Depart
ment must say whether it will allow
the scientists access to the bones. If
not, the case will likely proceed to trial.
The Interior Department must also
reveal in September whether it has
been able to culturally affiliate, or
link, the bones to any modern-day
Tribe, which is key in deciding who
gets custody of Kennewick Man.
Hanna says the advantage of hav
ing the federal government research
the origins of Kennewick Man is that
the findings will be made public and
available to everyone over the Inter
net.
DNA testing on Kennewick Man is
currently under way at Yale, the
University of Michigan and the Uni
versity of California-Davis.
The foundation for much of the dis
pute in the Kennewick Man case is
the 10-year-old federal law that has
been used to help Tribes reclaim
pieces of their stolen heritage arti
facts and the bones of their ancestors
from museums and other collections.
NAGPRA was an attempted com
promise between "existing scientific
methods and the cultural sensibili
ties and legitimate complaints of
American Indians that they were not
treated with respect," Hanna says.
Preventing study of Kennewick
Man with or without repatriation,
doesn't change the way Indians have
been treated, she says.
This case has been unusually com
plicated because the bones are so old,
and it has been a chance to see how
the law applies in the case of discov
ery rather than existing artifacts,
Hanna says.
"The vast majority of NAGPRA
cases are much, much simpler than
this one," Hanna says.
Woman is dedicated to protecting Tribal artifacts
THE DALLES, OR. (AP) - Lori
Watlamet first finds the rock, adorned
with a reddish spiral petroglyph, and
then notices that someone has
scooped out dirt from beneath it since
she last visited.
"They have no respect for the
people who were here before or the
people who come after," she said.
Watlamet, a law enforcement of
ficer for the Columbia River Inter
Tribal Fish Commission, is speaking
about the looters who dig for the rem
nants of the lives of the people who
once lived in American Indian vil
lages in the Columbia Gorge.
For Watlamet, who is Cayuse and
Umatilla, these are holes dug into her
culture and her history, wounds that
she works daily to prevent.
Watlamet, 37, has a job unique in
the Columbia Gorge, and one that
preservationists say is critical.
Watlamet patrols the gorge on the
lookout for people who dig up Ameri
can Indian graves, scratch over
petroglyphs or sift through the
gorge's cultural treasures looking for
easy money or a private thrill.
She also trains law enforcement
officers, archaeologists and others
how to identify, investigate and pros
ecute archaeological crimes. And she
tries to educate visitors, who might
inadvertently break the law by touch
ing a pictograph soiling it with the
oils of their hands or pocketing an
arrowhead lying on the ground.
"People don't realize when they are
taking something like that they are
taking it from everyone else," she
said. "It's such a selfish act."
Watlamet is the only law enforce
ment officer in the Columbia Gorge
with the sole directive to protect his
toric and prehistoric cultural resources.
Earlier this spring, Washington
State awarded her the 2000 State
Historic Officer's Award for Out
standing Achievement in Education.
She also was named the 2000 Con
servation Officer of the Year by the
national Native American Fish and
Wildlife Society.
Rob Whitlam, Washington state ar
chaeologist, said Watlament's work
has made her an inspiration to others.
"There is an individual out there
who took up the challenge to make a
difference and confront a crime that
not only results in the looting and
damage of archaeological sites, but
has a dramatic social impact in In
dian communities," he said.
Arrowhead collecting and other
kinds of artifact hunting was once
considered socially acceptable by
mainstream society. But it is illegal
a state and federal crime punish
able by large fines and jail, or fed
eral prison time for felony charges,
such as disturbing burials.
Tribes are also working to raise the
public's awareness of how archaeo
logical crimes hurt American Indian
people.
"Our perspective is this is not a vic
timless crime," said JefifVan Pelt, pro
gram manager of cultural resource
protection for the Confederated
Tribes of Umatilla. "We consider it a
hate crime."
Watlamet's work is paid through
two contracts totaling $160,000 from
the Bonneville Power Administration
through the Corps of Engineers,
which is required to mitigate for dam
age to cultural resources caused by
the dams.
She has jurisdiction on Native
American trust land and federal land
and is a certified police officer in Or
egon. In Washington, she assists
county and state agencies where
they have jurisdiction. Her territory
stretches from Bonneville Dam all the
way up to Dworshak Dam on the
Clearwater River Northeast of
Lewiston, Idaho.
Van Pelt said that especially with
the mixed jurisdictions along the
river, having Watlamet to help coor
dinate efforts and share the Tribes'
perspective is invaluable.
Republican Party apologizes to Tribes, offers new resolution
OLYMPIA, WA. (AP) The state Republican Party, scrambling to undo
some of the damage from a recent resolution against Tribal sovereignty,
has apologized and offered a substitute statement tha affirms Indians'
right to self-govern.
The new resolution, adopted recently by the Republican Party at the
suggestion of party Chairman Don Benton, is the latest effort at damage
control. Tribes, human rights groups, Democrats and newspaper editori
als have denounced a statement quietly adopted at the state Republican
convention last month in Spokane.
The original resolution, sponsored by John Fleming, a Skagit County
non-Indian who lives on the Swinomish Reservation, calls for the federal
government to "take whatever steps necessary to terminate all such non
republican forms of government on Indian reservations."
The state party offered an apology, saying it "truly regrets any anxiety
or discomfort caused by this resolution and that we, as a party, recognize
and reaffirm our continuing and ongoing support for Native American
sovereignty as well as their ability and right to self-govern as determined
by legal treaties signed with the United States of America."