By Anumita Kaur October 2024
 |
| Some of the 200 cultural items that
the Wyoming Episcopal Church returned to the Northern Arapaho tribe last week.
(Crystal C'Bearing) |
The Wyoming Episcopal diocese has
had about 200 Northern Arapaho tribal items since 1946. On Monday, the tribe
gets them back.
The Wyoming Episcopal Church is set
to return about 200 cultural items to the Northern Arapaho tribe on
Monday after a years-long effort by the tribe to repatriate the artifacts.
The momentous return for the
Northern Arapaho comes as Indigenous activists have urged
the nation to reckon with its violent history toward Native Americans. The
federal government has tightened laws to
return tribes’ items, cities have removed Christopher Columbus monuments, and under the Biden administration,
the federal government has said the federal holiday that falls on Monday marks
both Columbus Day and Indigenous Peoples’ Day.
The Wyoming Episcopal Church
possessed the Northern Arapaho tribe’s artifacts for nearly 80 years — ranging
from children’s toys to bows and arrows to traditional dresses. Given to the
church by a local store owner who bartered for the items, the state’s Episcopal
leadership had been reluctant to return the artifacts for decades, but it
shifted its stance as the tribe continued pressing for the items’ return and as
the nation more broadly recognized past wrongs toward Native Americans.
It’s about time the items return
home, said Jordan Dresser, a former chairman of the Northern Arapaho tribe and
one of the community leaders who worked for the artifacts’ return. The Northern
Arapaho reside in west central Wyoming on the Wind River Reservation.
“This is a huge win for us. This is
for the future. This is us being able to hold on to our culture and our legacy.
I get emotional about it, because I just never thought it was going to happen,”
Dresser said. “Repatriation has become a big, hot topic in this country, but
this is a battle that tribes have been fighting for years.”
The church said the items’ return is
long overdue.
“We hope that their return is the
beginning of reconciliation, healing and shared community between the Episcopal
Church in Wyoming and the Northern Arapaho people,” said Megan Nickles, chair
of the standing committee of the Wyoming Episcopal Church. “I would challenge
other institutions around the world that hold sacred items to also return them
home where they belong.”
The items will eventually be displayed in a museum —
currently under renovation — on the Wind River Reservation, Dresser said,
“where the Arapaho people can come learn about themselves.”
Beaded clothing items are some of
the artifacts being returned. (Crystal C'Bearing)
Across the country, Native American
tribes have fought for years to reclaim
their human remains and sacred items from museums, universities and other
entities.
The Native American Graves
Protection and Repatriation Act, passed by Congress in 1990, requires museums
and federal agencies to identify and send back sacred items to their respective
cultural groups. Compliance was slow — or nonexistent — and the Interior Department issued rules this year to strengthen the law, setting a deadline of five years for
federally funded entities to ensure their collections comply with the law.
Following the order, several museums
across the country began covering displays of artifacts from federally
recognized Native American and Native Hawaiian groups as they determined
whether they could obtain consent for the exhibits or would have to return the
artifacts, The Washington Post reported.
This helped create the perfect storm
for the Wyoming Episcopal Church to return the Northern Arapaho artifacts in
its possession. The church is not subject to that law, but it further
encouraged all American institutions to reevaluate what to do with artifacts
they possess, Dresser said.
The Episcopal Church in Wyoming had
possessed the items since 1946. Edith May Adams, who served at St. Michael’s
Mission in Ethete, Wyo., ran a small market where she amassed the items as many
Native residents would trade them in for necessities, the church said in a
statement. Adams later deeded the collection to the church, and the church held
the items for the next 78 years.
In 2012, Dresser and other tribe
members approached the church to obtain some of the items for a historical
display at the Wind River Hotel and Casino. At first, they were told no,
Dresser said.
“There were concerns about us having
capabilities of housing them. Some had issues with it being connected to a casino,”
Dresser said. “We felt like at the core of it, in our hearts, we knew how to
care for these items, we just didn’t have the technical expertise for it.”
Dresser went on to obtain a master’s degree in museum
studies. “Just to get that foot in the door — so at least one of our tribal
members has the technical expertise,” he said, stressing that the tribe “always
had the cultural expertise.”
Discussions continued, and
eventually the church agreed to loan the tribe about 20 items.
“Back in 2012, we were just happy
with the loan,” Dresser said. “Even though, in the back of my head, I thought
these should just be ours, because they are ours.”
The conversations did not stop —
tribal leaders pressed forward with discussions about the ultimate return of
the items to the Northern Arapaho. The tribe’s historic preservation office
made repatriation a priority, and many tribal members are also members of the
Episcopal Church. “They remind the church of their obligations to our people,”
Dresser said.
Twelve years later, their dream is
set to be realized Monday.
The approximately 200 items range
widely, Dresser said. There are beaded items and figurines, but Dresser’s
favorites are the rawhide suitcases. “The earliest suitcases that our people
used to put things in,” he said. “They’re just beautiful.”
The tribe and church plan to gather for a ceremony honoring
the items’ return. Now, after years of dispossession, comes the best part,
Dresser said: “It’s up to us what we want to do next.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/comments?storyUrl=https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/10/14/wyoming-arapaho-tribe-artifacts-return/
