The Senate confirmed Washington lawyer Keith Harper, a member of the Cherokee Nation, to be the U.S. representative to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday, making him the first member of a federally recognized tribe to be accorded an ambassadorial-rank post.
Harper, confirmed on a 52-42 party-line vote, has been active in human rights and civil rights organizations. He was also a mega-bundler, having raised more than $500,000 for President Obama’s 2012 campaign.
Harper was one of the plaintiffs’ lawyers in a long-running class-action lawsuit by Native Americans, who claimed that the federal government had mismanaged Indian trust accounts. The Obama administration settled the suit in 2009 for $3.4 billion.
Senate Committee on Indian Affairs Senate Committee on Indian Affairs Vice Chairman John Barrasso, R-Wyoming, and Chairman Jon Tester, D-Montana, listened to testimony at the committee’s hearing on American Indian students in public schools.
The federal government recently took a look at how American Indian children are faring in public schools—and the results are disturbing.
Minority children in public schools are generally subjected to harsher, more frequent disciplinary measures than are white students, according to the report, “School Discipline, Restraint, & Seclusion,” released by the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights. The data collection that served as the basis of the report covered all 97,000 public schools in the U.S., which serve 49 million pre-K through grade 12 students. Between 90 percent and 95 percent of American Indian and Alaska Native children are educated in public schools.
“The issue of unlawful racial discrimination in school discipline is… a civil rights issue,” states a U.S. Department of Education spokesperson. “Title VI protects students from discrimination based on race in connection with all academic, educational, extracurricular, athletic, and other programs and activities of a school, including programs and activities a school administers to ensure and maintain school safety and student discipline.
A few examples of the government’s findings: AI/AN children, who represented 0.5 percent of enrollment of the schools included in this calculation, accounted for 2 percent of single and multiple out-of-school suspensions and 3 percent of expulsions. On the other hand, they accounted for only 0.2 percent of in-school suspensions. By contrast, white students, who accounted for 51 percent of enrollment, comprised 40 percent of in-school suspensions, 36 percent and 31 percent of single and multiple out-of-school suspensions respectively and 36 percent of expulsions. These numbers suggest that the harsher the punishment (with in-school suspension at one end of the scale and expulsion at the other), the less likely is it to be applied to white students and the more likely it is to be imposed on AI/AN children.
Thirteen percent of AI/AN boys received out-of-school suspension, compared with 6 percent of white boys. Seven percent of AI/AN girls received out-of-school suspension, compared with just 2 percent of white girls.
More than twice as many students with disabilities received out-of-school suspensions (13 percent) than did non-disabled students (6 percent). A whopping 29 percent of AI/AN boys with disabilities received out-of-school suspensions, compared with 12 percent of white boys. Twenty percent of AI/AN girls with disabilities received out-of-school suspensions, compared with 6 percent of white girls with disabilities.
“The administration of student discipline can result in unlawful discrimination based on race in two ways: first, if a student is subjected to differenttreatment in discipline based on the student’s race, and second, if a discipline policy is neutral on its face—meaning that the policy itself does not mention race—and is administered in an evenhanded manner but has a disparate impact, i.e., a disproportionate and unjustified effect on students of a particular race,” explained the spokesperson.
The Office for Civil Rights can investigate potential violations if the data warrants. “The data showing disproportionalities by race and ethnicity provide a basis for OCR to investigate further, including all relevant circumstances, such as the facts surrounding a student’s actions and the discipline imposed, to determine whether there was discrimination.” For example, a September 2012 investigation of Oakland, California schools resulted in a “voluntary resolution agreement [that] addressed issues of whether African American students were disciplined more frequently and more harshly than white students,” says the department spokesperson.
William Mendoza, executive director of the White House Initiative on AI/AN Education, noted that the Office for Civil Rights report found other discrepancies in the education of AI/AN kids. For example, American Indian kindergarteners repeat the grade at nearly twice the rate of white children, AI/AN students go to schools with more first-year teachers than do white students and AI/AN students have the highest dropout rate of any racial or ethnic population, with a graduation rate of just 68 percent, compared with 75 percent for all students.
Mendoza testified that Impact Aid to help fund education for schools in districts with untaxable federal lands was funded at copy.2 billion for FY 2014, with half of that money going to public schools that educate children living on Indian lands.
Brent D. Gish, executive director of the National Indian Impacted Schools Association, put that number in perspective. While the Impact Aid program was established by Congress in 1950, it has not been fully funded since 1969. According to Dan Hudson, Wyoming State Impact Aid chairman and assistant superintendent of Fremont County School District #14, the Basic Support component of Impact Aid is currently funded at only 58 percent of authorization while the Payments for Property component is funded at just 3.5 percent of authorization.
Gish also noted that the Impact Aid program is not forward-funded, presenting challenges for planning and hiring. The 2013 federal sequester added to those challenges. “The sequester hit federally impacted Indian land school districts hard and to the detriment of the students, their communities and reservations,” he testified.
But there is good news too, as a number of panelists testified. For example, Alberto Siqueiros, superintendent of the Tohono O’odham Nation’s Baboquivari Unified School District, told the committee how his school district is in the process of completely transforming itself from a mediocre educational endeavor into an excelling school district by putting everything—from teacher hiring to community involvement and expectations for both faculty and kids—on the table.
“Long gone are the days of low expectations, mediocre performance and results often seen in tribal educational settings. We insist that the entire BUSD community support our efforts in educating our children,” he said. The results so far include a nearly 40 percent increase in graduation rates in the past five years, six Gates Millennium Scholars and one Dorrance Scholar in the past three years and over $2 million in scholarships in 2013. In that year, 52 seniors graduated, 30 applied to college, 24 were accepted and 19 enrolled in college.
School officials in Seminole County, Oklahoma, told Native American seniors at Seminole High School that they are prohibited from wearing eagle feathers on their graduation caps for Thursday’s ceremony. The officials said that it would violate graduation guidelines.
But 25 Native seniors will walk across the stage on Thursday night, some vowing to wear the feathers anyway. “This is a way of expressing who we are,” Kaden Tiger told KFOR news. “I’m still going to wear it. I can’t take it off. Can’t make me.”
Tiger was given the eagle feather for being an outstanding citizen of the Seminole Nation and has already tied it to his cap, along with tribal beads. “I wasn’t going to go by the rules anyway because it’s my right,” he said. “The accomplishment of completing high school is pretty big for me. That eagle feather represents what I’ve accomplished.”
Tiger’s graduation cap (KFOR.com)
According to PublicSchoolReview.com, at least half of the school’s enrollment is American Indian. And the fact that its mascot, the Chieftains, wears a headdress and eagle feathers seems contradictory to some.
Amari White (Seminole, Creek, Choctaw and Chickasaw), a parent of one of the graduates said, “It does confuse me, that you use the Chieftain mascot, but you can’t honor it with a feather when you have it painted on the wall… it confuses me.”
Despite this confusion, school officials said that none of the students are allowed to wear embellishments on their mortarboards. “While we applaud the many accolades our students have received in their activities outside the school environment, our graduation ceremony is designed specifically to honor achievements attained under the district’s purview,” said Jeff Pritchard, the school’s superintendent, in a statement on Wednesday.
FILE – In this May 7, 2014, file photo, residents make their way along First Street in the village of Tanana, Alaska. Without a jail or even armed law enforcement, the isolated Alaska village where two state troopers were shot and killed is turning to a traditional form of justice: banishment. The Tanana Village Council, the Athabascan Indian tribal authority in the village of 250, is taking steps to expel two men whose actions contributed to the homicides and who have threatened other community members, council Chairman Curtis Sommer said. (AP Photo/Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Eric Engman, File)
By Dan Joling, The Associated Press
Without a jail or even armed law enforcement, the isolated Alaska village where two state troopers were shot and killed is turning to a traditional form of justice: banishment.
The Tanana Village Council, the Athabascan Indian tribal authority in the village of 250, is taking steps to expel two men whose actions contributed to the homicides and who have threatened other community members, council Chairman Curtis Sommer said.
“This is the only way we have to remove individuals who are — how do we say it? — who are dangerous to members of the community,” Sommer said.
The action is infrequent in Alaska, and when it is used, some question whether a tribal entity has the right to limit access to a community otherwise governed by state law. Those who are banished rarely contest the action publicly, and it isn’t clear if banished residents go on to cause problems in other communities because no one tracks them.
“We like to think that we have the right to travel wherever we want,” said Anchorage attorney Wayne Anthony Ross, who former Gov. Sarah Palin nominated for Alaska attorney general in 2009. “On the other hand, a small village should have the right to decide who they want to live in that village, specifically if that person is a troublemaker. I can see both sides of it.”
If it’s not lawful, it should be, said Heather Kendall-Miller, senior staff attorney for the Native American Rights Fund in Anchorage. Tribal councils always have attempted to protect the peace.
“It seems to me like a reasonable approach to avoid violent situations, especially when you have no law enforcement providers within a community,” she said. “Try to pre-empt a bad situation before it happens.”
Tanana is on the Yukon River, a traditional transportation artery in Alaska’s vast interior. More than a century after changing from trading site to permanent community, Tanana has a school, clinic and store but no mental health treatment facilities and no connection to the highway system.
The state can’t afford to pay for law enforcement in small villages like this but they also refuse to let tribes have full authority over law enforcement, beyond an unarmed public safety officer, Kendall-Miller said. State troopers are flown in to deal with violence, but they can sometimes take days to arrive.
The latest trouble in Tanana began when Arvin Kangas, 58, drove into town without a license and pointed a gun at the unarmed village public safety officer, investigators said. He called Alaska State Troopers, and one day later, on May 1, Sgt. Scott Johnson and Trooper Gabe Rich flew to Tanana. As they tried to arrest Kangas, his son, Nathanial “Satch” Kangas, 20, shot and killed the officers, investigators said.
The village council later voted to banish Arvin Kangas and a second man who has assaulted tribal employees, Sommer said. The matter, after legal review, will be presented to the tribal court for a final decision at an undetermined date.
Banishment is not limited to Athabascan communities. Last August, a man identified as a drug supplier stepped off a flight to Sand Point, a city with strong Aleut and Scandinavian roots at the beginning of the Aleutian Chain. A semi-circle of residents informed the man he was not welcome. They bought him a return ticket and he never left the airport terminal, said Tina Anderson, who witnessed the exchange. The fishing community has a high rate of drug abuse.
“We’re tired of it, and we’re concerned about the future of the community,” she said.
Akiak, a Yupik Eskimo village in southwest Alaska, voted in April 2013 to ban a man suspected of bootlegging and dealing drugs.
Sommer concedes banishment is a “slippery slope.”
“It’s got to be very significant circumstances that would warrant this, either violent assaults or murder,” he said. “At what point do we draw the line on this? I do not know. I do know it’s not going to be used frivolously just to get back at someone.”
The village council will ask the state to enforce banishments. The Alaska Department of Law said it would carefully evaluate a banishment order. Kendall-Miller has seen unofficial support in the past.
“We have seen state police officers that have attempted to accommodate the tribal council’s blue ticket orders by helping to prevent individuals from coming back,” Kendall-Miller said. “It has been an informal arrangement that was done out of necessity.”
“If they do not enforce it, we will enforce it ourselves. We will get a group of men together and go to that person and tell him to leave and to not come back.”
Read more here: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2014/05/16/3197717/re-visioning-native-america.html?sp=/99/1683/#storylink=cpy
Courtesy of Tacoma Art Museum
When Northwest artist Matika Wilbur was at an airport with her 9-year-old nephew, they happened upon a display case of Swinomish tribal art — their own people. Except the label explained, “The Swinomish were a hunter-gatherer tribe who lived in the Puget Sound region …”
Wilbur’s nephew turned to her, and asked sadly, “Aunty, why does it say ‘we were,’ not ‘we are?’ ”
The answer to that question opens at the Tacoma Art Museum on Saturday. Wilbur, a Swinomish/Tulalip photographer, is unveiling the first part of her “Project 562,” a multiyear, multimedia odyssey to document every recognized Native American tribe in the United States — to show, in fact, the “we are.”
Supported by the museum from the beginning, the project’s nearly halfway done, with 200 out of (now) 566 tribes documented in startling silver gelatin portraits, audio interviews and short films. Around 40 of the portraits will be on view at Saturday’s opening, along with Wilbur herself to give a talk on her journey to turn around the imagery of contemporary Native America.
“When you Google ‘African American’ you get beautiful images of people doing what we do now — kids on swings, businesspeople in suits,” says Wilbur. “If you Google ‘Latino’ or ‘Asian American’, the same. But for Native American, what you’ll find is images of previous centuries.”
That kind of negative, stereotypical imagery, Wilbur adds, affects self-esteem, worsening problems in many tribes of alcohol addiction, drug use and teen suicide.
“As a teacher, I lost a lot of students to suicide,” she says. “I argue that image does affect our consciousness, our children. It’s been proven in studies.”
Four years ago, Wilbur decided to change that imagery.
“I’m hopeful, I believe things can change,” she says. “I thought, what if things could change for young people? What if I could be a part of that? That was my dream, my goal.”
Planning, applying for grants, doing a Kickstarter campaign, contacting tribes and finally driving around the country, she has covered 60,000 miles since November 2012, spending around five days in each place, taking audio and photographic portraits of at least three men and three women in each tribe, thus the name “Project 562.” Along the way she’s raised national media awareness through NBC, NPR, BBC, The New York Times, The Huffington Post, even Buzzfeed.com.
“What I’m attempting to do is to offer a contemporary image that showcases our heroes,” says Wilbur.
And much of the credit goes to the Tacoma Art Museum. With a budget of $500,000 to pay for travel and costs for a book, films and educational curriculum, Wilbur “desperately needed a big institution to put their name on the project.” Most of the institutions she approached either doubted or laughed at the project — except Tacoma.
“(Senior curator) Rock Hushka was like, ‘Let’s do it. I’ll help you. What do you need?’” Wilbur says. “That’s not what museums normally do. They usually borrow your work when it’s finished.”
Wilbur also points out the museum got on board long before they accepted the enormous Haub collection of Western art, much of which comes from that previous-century perspective on native identity.
And so, this weekend, TAM gets to host the inaugural “Project 562” exhibition through October, before it travels to other venues. (The Haub wing opens shortly afterward.)
“‘Project 562’ provides ample evidence of the diversity and vibrancy of contemporary Native Americans,” says Hushka. “Only a photographer of Wilbur’s caliber could capture this with such grace and clarity.”
The exhibition will be accompanied by various lectures, as well as being the centerpiece for the museum’s annual Native Northwest Community Celebration on May 31. A member reception Saturday night will include hoop dancers from Phoenix; singers from the Swinomish and Tulalip tribes; a blessing from the Puyallup tribe and more.
Wilbur also is collaborating with fashion designer Bethany Yellowtail (Crow Nation) on a “562” fashion line, which the artist hopes will fund the project into the future. The first items are scarves that double as shawls, with design elements (cedar, cracked earth) that tell stories from different tribes.
What speaks loudest in “Project 562,” however, are Wilbur’s portraits. Shot against desert landscapes, calm Puget Sound waters, city streets or plain walls, they show tough teens, patient elders, cowboys, young women in denim, older women in regalia. And while the background is important — places her subjects felt most tied to — it’s reduced to black-and-white, while the people themselves stand out in color.
Spending up to three hours, Wilbur also interviewed her subjects extensively, diving into their deepest dreams and loyalties.
“I asked them where they grew up, why they stayed or left, about their family and what’s not in the history books about their people,” she says. “Then I talked about more serious things — what does it mean to be a sovereign nation? About assimilation, education, values, wellness, racial stereotypes … and what does it mean to be a member of your community? … That question is important for me, because it grapples with the concept of being ‘Indian enough.’”
While Wilbur’s work asks big questions and has been described as provocative, Wilbur says what matters most is how it attempts to connect actual living Native American cultures with the rest of Western society, reversing the “historical inaccuracies about Indian identity.” It also creates a central location where those cultures have visual representation.
“It’s more about the intimacy of the portraits and the stories they convey,” she says. “It’s also time we allowed our young Native people to see themselves in a positive light. To move beyond poverty porn and give them something hopeful.”
Read more here: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2014/05/16/3197717/re-visioning-native-america.html?sp=/99/1683/#storylink=cpy
PHOENIX (AP) – A former U.S. Attorney from Arizona will be the first Native American woman to serve on the federal bench.
Hopi citizen Diane Humetewa easily won confirmation on May 14 in the U.S. Senate in a 96-0 vote. The four senators who didn’t vote were Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), John Boozman (R-Ark.), Christopher Coons (D-Del.) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.)
She will fill one of six vacancies in the federal District Court of Arizona.
Humetewa currently serves as special counsel at Arizona State University, where she is also a professor.
She served as U.S. Attorney for Arizona between 2007 and 2009.
She also was an appellate court judge for the Hopi Tribe.
The National Congress of American Indians praised the confirmation, saying Humetewa has dedicated her time to serving the interests of Native peoples.
“The National Congress of American Indians congratulates Diane J. Humetewa of the Hopi Indian Tribe on her confirmation as federal judge in the U.S. District Court of Arizona. As the newest member of the federal bench, she is the first Native American woman ever appointed to serve in that position,” a NCAI press release states. “The Honorable Humetewa is impeccably qualified for her new role. She has practiced law in federal courts for over a decade – as Special Assistant U.S. Attorney, as Assistant U.S. Attorney, and as the U.S. Attorney for Arizona – and is experienced in a wide array of complex proceedings, hearings, and cases. Further, Judge Humetewa has dedicated time to serving the interests of Native peoples. She has been the Appellate Court judge for the Hopi Tribe, counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, and special advisor to the President on American Indian Affairs at Arizona State University. NCAI greatly appreciates the efforts of the President and Senate in achieving this historic confirmation. There are many qualified, talented people like Diane Humetewa in Indian Country who are able and willing to serve. We eagerly anticipate many more nominations of Native people to the federal bench and other offices.”
The overburdened District Court of Arizona remains one of the busiest in the country, having declared a judicial emergency in 2011
AP Photo/The Salt Lake Tribune, Trent Nelson Ryan Bundy, son of the Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, rides an ATV into Recapture Canyon north of Blanding, Utah on Saturday, May 10, 2014, in a protest against what demonstrators call the federal government’s overreaching control of public lands. The area has been closed to motorized use since 2007 when an illegal trail was found that cuts through Ancestral Puebloan ruins. The canyon is open to hikers and horseback riders.
ATVs have not been allowed through Recapture Canyon since 2007, but that didn’t stop a group of protesters on Saturday, May 10 from riding the trail—which is full of Native American sacred sites—anyway.
The Bureau of Land Management closed Recapture Canyon in Blanding, Utah to ATVs in 2007 after enthusiasts were caught trying to construct another trail illegally, and in so doing damaged archaeological sites, reports The Salt Lake Tribune.
Saturday’s ride was a demonstration by residents and San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman that they want control of the lands in public hands, a fight that has been going on for eight years. Only eight percent of San Juan County is not managed by the BLM, reports the Los Angeles Times.
Lyman and others who want the canyon reopened to ATVs argue that their families have been using the land for recreation for years.
“My grandfather called that canyon the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen in his life. It’s important to our family. To see it as the focal point of a conflict is painful,” Lyman said before riding into the canyon on an ATV, to the Los Angeles Times.
People listen to San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman at Centennial Park in Blanding, Utah on Saturday, May 10, 2014. Lyman organized an ATV protest ride into nearby Recapture Canyon to show that the federal agency isn’t the “supreme authority” and local residents have a right to have their opinions heard. The area has been closed to motorized use since 2007 when an illegal trail was found that cuts through Ancestral Puebloan archaeological sites. The canyon is open to hikers and horseback riders. (AP Photo/The Salt Lake Tribune, Trent Nelson)
But there are others who have been in the area for far longer than Lyman and his supporters.
“Since well before the state of Nevada, the federal government, and farmers and ranchers occupied the area, tribal nations—including the Las Vegas Band of Paiute, Moapa Band of Paiute, and other tribes in the area—have respected and honored the Utah Canyon as a sacred place,” the National Congress of American Indians said in a statement opposing the ride. “Native peoples believe the canyon contains many markers from their ancestors. An action like this is no more appropriate than a similar activity at a church or other place of worship.”
This April 9, 2011 photo shows an Anasazi ruin in the cliff close to “Lem’s Trail” in Recapture Canyon, near Blanding, Utah. A San Juan County commissioner tired of waiting for the Bureau of Land Management led an ATV ride into the canyon May 10, 2014. (AP Photo/The Salt Lake Tribune, Scott Sommerdorf)
A number of other groups have also spoken out against the ride.
“We believe the [Bureau of Land Management] should be providing more law enforcement to protect and preserve the cultural and natural resources for which it is the nation’s caretaker, and not providing more motorized access to areas containing cultural and natural resources that it has demonstrated that it is unable to protect,” Leigh J. Kuwanwisiwma, preservation director for the Hopi, wrote in a May 1 letter to the BLM.
“It is sad that irreplaceable treasures of importance to all Americans would be sacrificed on the altar of anti-government fervor,” Jerry Spangler, executive director of the Colorado Plateau Archaeological Alliance, said in a statement. “It is worse that protesters would be so blinded to their own insensitivity as to what others consider to be sacred treasures of their past.”
Willie Grayeyes, chair of a nonprofit that lobbies to protect Navajo land, was offended not only by the lack of sensitivity of the riders for Native culture, but also because a veterans retreat had to be relocated because of the protest.
“This opportunity for healing, to help these men and women has been postponed due to the threats of illegal activities by San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman on behalf of those who desire to drive their ATV toys over the sacred ruins of others,” wrote Grayeyes in a letter to The Salt Lake Tribune.
Many are comparing this recent protest to the exploits of private rancher Cliven Bundy in Nevada, whose cattle graze for free on U.S. government land.
It started with the discovery of long-forgotten gravestones in a thicket of bramble and alder. That set one author on the faint trail of a feisty Native American woman and oyster farmer who lived in 19th century western Washington.
Author LLyn De Danaan at home in Mason County, Washington.
Credit Mary Randlett
The biographer is using the resulting book to inspire other Northwesterners — particularly tribal members. She wants to bring out the stories of people who, in her words, have been “left out of our histories.”
The waterfront cottage that LLyn De Danaan calls home on Oyster Bay in Mason County, Washington, overlooks a cultural crossroads rich in history. So it is fortunate she is a cultural anthropologist by profession. Her eyes and ears are tuned to signs and stories of place. And at this place, waves of settlers came from the earliest times to reap shellfish.
De Danaan moved here in the early 1970s. In recent decades, she heard enough tales about one pioneer to start a file. The name was Katie Gale. This independent businesswoman owned property and tidelands in her own name in the late 1800s.
“That was all a little bit unusual from conventional wisdom and things I had heard about both people in the oyster business and Native American women,” says De Danaan.
Finding Katie Gale
The biographer was fascinated by how Gale straddled different worlds and stood up for herself and her mixed race children.
“Katie Gale: A Coast Salish Woman’s Life on Oyster Bay” was published last fall.
Credit University of Nebraska Press
“I suppose there just were too many things about that that intrigued me that I couldn’t let go of it,” she says. “I literally couldn’t let go of it for years!”
A turning point came when De Danaan and several friends from the historical society discovered an overgrown little homestead graveyard a mile from her house. One of the headstones belonged to Katie Gale.
“I was so amazed, excited, enthralled that I began beating on Stan’s shoulders as he was kneeling in front of me holding this stone.”
Her friend had to plead with her to contain her excitement and stop it.
“I literally said, ‘I know who this is,’ as if she were an acquaintance of mine. But it almost felt that way,” recalls De Danaan. “I would say that was a moment of calling. I have to tell this woman’s story. I have to know her.”
But here’s the problem: the long-dead Katie Gale left no letters, no journals. De Danaan could find no photographs of her, no living descendants. The best source material was a divorce case file. It took almost a decade to accumulate corroborating details, context and enough educated guesses to write a biography. “Katie Gale: A Coast Salish Woman’s Life on Oyster Bay” was published last fall.
“So many stories not told”
But the tale doesn’t stop there.
“There are so many stories not told,” says De Danaan. “There are so many histories and people left out of our histories. That is what my work has to be now. I feel that it is my obligation to do that.”
At a writing class at the Evergreen State College Longhouse in Olympia, De Danaan is a guest speaker.
De Danaan exhorts the seminar to bring forth stories before they’re lost, perhaps starting with family history. This is a message De Danaan returns to again and again in regular public talks and one-on-one mentoring.
“You’re able to find out a lot more than you think,” she says.
All of the students in the circle facing the author this day are Native American. It takes awhile, but eventually sensitivities come out.
Keeping tradition and culture alive
Author LLyn De Danaan (right) discussed her biography of Katie Gale with students at The Evergreen State College.
Credit Tom Banse / Northwest News Network
One student says she was hesitant about taking the class. Her grandmothers warned against exposing too much of their Spokane tribal heritage to outsiders who might twist it or exploit it.
Makah tribal member Vince Cook heard that from his elders too.
“That’s a tough one,” he says. “Because when I was younger we were told not to record, not to videotape.”
Cook says attitudes are changing now as people see tradition and culture slipping away. He feels spurred to write about his great grandmother and all the things she taught him.
“I think it is important to continue on not only for myself, but for my family and for others to know about the Makah culture and to keep it alive,” says Cook.
AP Image In this aerial photo taken from WTHR Chopper 13, FBI agents work around the home of 91-year-old Donald Miller in Waldron, Ind. on Wednesday, April 2, 2014. Authorities seized thousands of Native American, Russian, Chinese and other artifacts that have “immeasurable” cultural value from Miller’s private collection, the FBI said Wednesday. The items, which also came from Haiti, Australia, New Guinea and Peru, were collected by Miller over eight decades, FBI Special Agent Robert Jones said at a news conference.
The recent discovery by the FBI of a giant horde of Native artifacts and remains held by Don Miller in Rush County, Indiana offers an opportunity to take a deeper look into the eccentric, obsessive and sometimes shadowy world of such collecting.
Miller, 91, has been well known by as a collector of Indian and other artifacts for years. His collection includes the remains of over 100 Native ancestors, according to tribal leaders consulted by the FBI in the case. Many of the remains are labeled with names that can be traced to Native families alive today. “He had a head with an arrowhead stuck in it, like a skull and all kinds of Indian artifacts from arrowheads to hatchets to peace pipes to just anything,” neighbor Joe Runnebohm told theIndianapolis Star.
According to Drew Northern, FBI Supervisory Special Agent, the agency is reaching out to Tribal Historic Preservation Officers for assistance in repatriating items and remains found at Miller’s home. Within days of the find, the FBI coordinated a conference call and face-to-face meeting with THPO leaders at the Indianapolis office. “Building lasting relationships with tribes and repatriation is our goal,” Northern said.
Although early news reports described the FBI removal of the artifacts and remains from Miller’s home as a raid, later reports indicated that Miller is cooperating with authorities and had invited them into his home to take the items.
The exterior of Don Miller’s home in Rush County, Indiana, where artifacts were found. (Pember)
Although Agent Northern would not discuss how Miller came to the attention of the FBI, it seems likely that the collector may have been trying to sell or donate his artifacts. According to the Greensburg Daily News, Miller recently offered his collection to the Rush County Historical Society. Since the organization has limited space, leaders declined his offer.
Many of today’s natural history museums collections are based on donations from wealthy antiquarians wishing to leave personal legacies, says Christopher Moore, professor of Anthropology at the University of Indianpolis. “As colonial empires expanded in the 18th and 19th century, wealthy travelers would bring strange things back with them, often amassing huge collections that they displayed in their homes.”
This colonial practice continues today. Miller amassed his collection during 52 years of world travel as a missionary. He made no secret of his collection and frequently invited school groups and neighbors in to see his private museum, that included not only Native artifacts and remains but also cultural items from all over the world. A 1992 piece in the Indianapolis Star told the story of Miller and his personal museum.
Although some of the items in his collection may have been acquired illegally, no charges have been brought against Miller. Many of the artifacts were found by Miller during his travels, but he has so many items that it seems reasonable to assume he also bought or traded.
According to a Native artifacts dealer who asked to remain anonymous, Miller was a regular at artifact shows in the region.
Miller could not be reached for comment. Several prominent signs are currently posted along the property line of his Rush County home warning that trespassers will be prosecuted.
We may never learn complete details about Millers great horde and what drove him to amass it. His story, however, brings up tantalizing questions about those who are compelled to dig the earth in search of such treasures.
The subculture of artifact hunting, collecting, trading and selling spans an enormous spectrum from benign to bizarre, and involves a vast array of participants, from aging missionaries to meth heads.
Although the general public opinion regarding the legality and damage of digging for and collecting artifacts is slow to change, authorities are stepping up efforts to address this practice.
Bambi Kraus, President of the National Association of Tribal Historic Preservation Officers describes the FBI’s handling of the Miller case as a sea change for the agency. “This has never happened before that I know of, “ she said of the FBI’s decision to bring in tribes at the beginning of such an investigation.
“It was worth all those years of urging people to work with Indian tribes,” said Kraus.
Ben Barnes, second chief of the Shawnee tribe of Oklahoma, drove to Indianapolis to participate in the tribal consultation meeting with the FBI. He was impressed by agents’ displays of respect and concern especially regarding remains.
“The agents have been very active in making sure the ancestors are being taken care of; they are treating them respectfully and storing them in a special place away from other evidence.”
Past FBI investigations and seizures of Native artifacts have not ended as well such as the 2009 case in Utah.
One of those arrested during what then Interior Secretary Ken Salazar described as the biggest bust of Native artifact thieves, committed suicide. Residents of the region were outraged over what they described as heavy-handed tactics used by the FBI and the Bureau of Land Management, whose officers bust into suspects homes armed and wearing flak jackets.
Agent Northern did not respond directly to questions regarding the impact of the Utah case on the FBI’s handling of this case. “Our goal is to be as transparent,” he said, “mindful and respectful as possible and try to learn from what hasn’t gone well in the past.”
source: Waddington’s, via theglobeandmail.com Lot 22 – ‘Northern Plains Indian Child’s Tunic, early 19th century fringed and with beaded collar, showing signs of central bullet trauma.’
When the Toronto-based Waddington’s auction house held a pre-show viewing of items to be sold during its auction of the late William Jamieson’s collection, a blood-stained “Northern Plains Indian Child’s Tunic,” complete with a bullet hole, was among the items. An outpouring of anger ensued, and Waddington’s soon pulled the item from the listing.
Responding to the outcry, Waddington’s President Duncan McLean told the Globe and Mail, “We don’t want to upset anybody, so are withdrawing the item and returning it to the consignor.”
Though Waddington’s responded by removing the item to be auctioned, several more native artifacts were auctioned from April 29th to May 1st, including a Pair of Lakota moccasins said to have been owned by Sitting Bull, which sold for $9,000, a Sioux Saddle blanket and pouch, which sold for $3,120, an Iroquois False Face Society Mask, which sold for $2,640, and more.
The child’s tunic was of interest to Jamieson because the garment had a bullet hole in the center of the chest and visible blood stains. Jamieson was known in the rare-item collectors world as the “Master of the Macabre” — a label backed up by his collection of items on auction at Waddington’s. In addition to the Native artifacts, other items listed at Waddington’s included an electric chair, a bone model of a guillotine, a medieval wrought-iron ‘Shame’ mask and more.
The items on sale at Waddington’s also caused an outcry from First Nations communities in Canada. In particular, the Haudenosaunee Council forbids the sale or exhibition of medicine masks.
Hayden King, a member of Beausoleil First Nation who teaches history and native politics at Ryerson University, told the Globe and Mail, “I’m generally of the belief that they should be returned. Some government agencies and museums agree, but the market includes many players who do not.”
“It all reflects this apparently endemic belief that native people are extinct, so we can do whatever we want with their stuff,” said King.
Sean Quinn, Waddington’s decorative arts specialist who appraised the tunic to be worth $2,000 to $3,000 told the Globe and Mail, “It was very, very difficult for me to catalogue [the tunic], because of its relation to a terrible period of history, the death of any child is horrific.”
When Jamieson died in 2011, his fiancée Jessica Phillips took to selling his collection, which also included authentic shrunken heads and necklaces made of human teeth. Though she says she agrees the tunic is a piece of history, it is up to the executors to decide where it ends up.
