Under legislation signed by former President Barack Obama in December , the remains were transferred from the federal government to the tribes. Show caption. Share story. By Sara Jean Green. And that's where the trouble began. As Discover reported in :. The United States Army Corps of Engineers maintained the land where Kennewick Man was found; furthermore, that particular stretch of the Columbia also fell within the borders of sacred homeland claimed by five Pacific Northwest Native American tribes.
In George W. Bush signed the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act , as reparations for the disrespectful manner in which Native American remains were treated in the past. The law serves as a means for Native Americans to gain possession of cultural items — bones included — that once belonged to their ancestors if cultural affiliation, or a connection to their lineage, could be established.
In , the then-Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt determined that the remains belonged to the tribe, and ordered their return. However, in , the scales shifted in favor of the scientists. The remains were turned over to the scientists, and the decision was upheld in appeals. The decision was a blow to the five tribes. The Burke Museum provided secure and respectful curation of The Ancient One from —, under contract to the US Army Corps of Engineers, the government agency that controlled the remains until they were repatriated.
The return of the Ancient One to the tribes is the right decision and was long overdue. The Burke Museum values our long-standing relationships with the tribes, the U.
On July 28, , two men at Columbia Park in Kennewick, Washington, accidentally found part of a human skull on the bottom of the Columbia River, about ten feet from shore.
Public interest, debate, and controversy began when independent archaeologist Dr. James Chatters, working on contract with the Benton County coroner, thought that the bones might not be Native American. The results indicated an age older than 9, years, making The Ancient One among the oldest and most complete skeletons found in North America. Subsequent research on the bones indicated that the skeleton is between 8,—8, years old. Shortly after the remains were discovered, a group of scholars sued the federal government—representing the U.
NAGPRA, passed in , provides legal protections for Native American human remains, including their return to tribal communities if the tribes can prove they are related to the remains. The scientists argued that the remains were not proven to be related to present-day tribes, therefore they should not be subject to NAGPRA, and should be available to the scientific community for study.
Several Washington and Oregon tribes joined the Federal Government in defending the suit. Therefore, The Ancient One remained under the control of the U. Army Corps of Engineers, and scientific study by the plaintiffs was allowed to take place. The Burke was contracted by the Northwestern Division, United States Army Corps of Engineers to provide curatorial services for the remains, which included providing a secure environment for the remains and associated records.
After the ruling, the plaintiffs and their colleagues made three visits to the Burke Museum to carry out scientific research on the remains. Representatives of some of the tribes involved in the case also visited the remains to conduct ceremonies, and remained committed to having The Ancient One repatriated.
In September , Dr. Douglas Owsley, Smithsonian physical anthropologist and one of the plaintiffs in the case, shared his morphology based findings that indicated that the skeleton was not of Native American affinity, and may have been more closely related to circumpacific groups such as the Ainu and Polynesians.
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