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For Anishinaabe in Twin Ports, a piece of home is returned

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For Anishinaabe in Twin Ports, a piece of home is returned

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I choose this article because Bobby is also Anishinaabe, and the article talks about native lands being taken from native communities.

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SUPERIOR, Wis. - Wild and lush Wisconsin Point, a forested sandbar that straddles Lake Superior and Allouez Bay, long has been treasured for swimming, smelting and hiking.

But for centuries, a thriving community of Anishinaabe lived there, long before and after the nearby Fond du Lac Reservation was established. And they were buried on the 3-mile peninsula until nearly 200 graves were exhumed to make way for a burgeoning steel industry in the early 1900s and villagers were forced to leave their homes.

But now, thanks to efforts by leaders of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa and an Indigenous member of the Superior City Council, sacred burial grounds are back under the ownership of the Lake Superior Chippewa, part of its systematic effort to reclaim its homelands. It aligns with a cultural shift developing nationally, as Indigenous land reclamation and stronger protection of Native American graves is a priority of the Biden administration.

It's only in recent years the tribe has been able to legitimately sit at the table, but it has never stopped fighting to restore its land on the point, said its leader, Kevin Dupuis.

"We are obligated to our ancestors," he said. "The fights they had never ended. We just picked them up."
An 'atrocity' committed
A 1913 map of Superior and its surrounding waterways declares it "the new steel center." Indeed, U.S. Steel wanted to build iron ore docks along Wisconsin Point, and in 1918 used federal money intended for the Fond Du Lac Band to remove bodies, ship them up the Nemadji River and rebury them in mass graves at Superior's St. Francis Cemetery.

The bodies of Chief Joseph Osaugie and another leader, Maangizid, both signers of the 1854 Treaty that ceded northeastern Minnesota land to the government and established reservations and rights for area tribes, were among those exhumed.

But the sandy point wasn't suitable for industrialization, and the docks were never built. Some Ojibwe families fought U.S. Steel in court over the land, but the company prevailed and became owner in the 1920s. Eventually, most families left, including the grandmother of Hermantown resident Bob Miller, who was born on the point in 1913 and whose family left when she was 8. Then, his grandmother Irene McCauley was sent to a Native American boarding school in Odanah, Wis. It resulted in loss of her Ojibwe language and many traditional cultural practices, said Miller, a retired Duluth teacher of Native American studies and history.

But she always wanted to return to the peaceful home where her family fished for herring and she played with dolls made from deer hide.

"She remembered it, and she wanted it back," said Miller, a seventh-generation descendant of Osaugie.

"The atrocity" of what U.S. Steel did, said Chantal Norrgard, assistant professor of First Nation Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Superior, is part of settler colonialism.

The development of the port of Duluth and Superior was incredibly important to captains of industry and the federal government, and the cession of land by the Ojibwe through its treaties was crucial to those plans, she said.
A city accountable
Last year, after a radio-sponsored city medallion hunt ended with searchers rooting through the Wisconsin Point burial grounds, Superior City Council member Jenny Van Sickle and Mayor Jim Paine met with Fond du Lac leaders about returning the land. They were skeptical it would get done, Van Sickle said, because they've seen politicians make promises before.

But Van Sickle, a member of the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes and Sitka Tribe of Alaska, began the arduous process, and at an August ceremony, the city officially transferred the cemetery on the point back to the band. Superior's St. Francis Xavier Church also transferred to the Fond du Lac band the land where bodies were re-buried along the Nemadji River, a rundown plot where erosion has led to bones resurfacing and washing into the water.

"The takeaway is your elected officials can do more; you can push them to do more," Van Sickle said. "Superior isn't the only one facing [such issues]. We were just the city willing to be accountable."
Trauma remains
In the Twin Ports, the Fond du Lac band considers Wisconsin Point and west along the St. Louis River about two dozen miles to the reservation a "cultural corridor" steeped in significance to the Anishinaabe.

Dupuis, who for years has made monthly treks to Fond du Lac burial grounds in Duluth and Superior to offer tobacco to his ancestors, said reclaiming the land that holds them matters, but the trauma remains. And it's not just from U.S. Steel's actions a century ago, he said. In 2017, the Minnesota Department of Transportation dug up burial grounds in western Duluth as they started work on a bridge project.

"The footprints of Indigenous people are all over the state of Minnesota," Dupuis said, and tribes know locations of culturally important sites. "We will tell you where these significant places are. Pick up the phone."

The desecrations have at least led to improved communication with state agencies and heightened visibility of Indigenous people, said Thomas Howes, a descendant of Maangizid and the natural resources manager for the band.

"It's important for the psyche of Indigenous people to be acknowledged," he said, "so you're not just this ghost of your ancestors."
'A shared commitment to healing'
The band of 4,200 members believes many more bodies remain buried on Wisconsin Point, as only those with marked graves were removed. It hopes to restore more land, to connect what it owns on the end of the point with the cemetery. In 2017 it reclaimed about 12 acres of surplus land from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It wants to preserve and protect what is there, and find a way to educate those who come upon the site.

The cemetery is marked by a sign toward the end of the point, and tall cement barriers surrounding a memorial plaque act as protection and resting places for the gifts of tobacco, stones, flowers and dolls left by visitors honoring Anishinaabe spirits. Over the years, offerings have been stolen, said Miller, who regularly maintains the site.

"They don't understand why all of this is out here," he said. "All of these things mean something to someone."

The band will apply to put the reclaimed land into federal trust, a lengthy process that makes it part of the reservation. The Biden administration is committed to restoring tribal homelands and is working to quicken the process, along with modernizing regulations that protect Native American graves, said Bryan Newland, assistant secretary of the Office of Indian Affairs in the U.S. Department of Interior.

Newland, who attended the August land transfer ceremony in Cloquet, said the work between Superior and the band "is a really good example of what happens when there is a shared commitment to healing ... and when communities value tribes."

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For Anishinaabe in Twin Ports, a piece of home is returned

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SUPERIOR, Wis. - Wild and lush Wisconsin Point, a forested sandbar that straddles Lake Superior and Allouez Bay, long has been treasured for swimming, smelting and hiking. But for centuries, a thriving community of Anishinaabe lived there, long before and after the nearby Fond du Lac Reservation was established.

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UC Berkeley Is Returning Thousands of Ancestral Remains to Indigenous People

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UC Berkeley Is Returning Thousands of Ancestral Remains to Indigenous People

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I choose this article because in the story about Minik, he talks about his fathers remains being kept by a museum, and only getting them back after he had passed away.

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Justin Sullivan/Getty UC Berkeley

The remains of thousands of ancestors will be returned to Indigenous tribes by the University of California, Berkeley.

"It wasn't right for past generations to dig up their remains and take them to Berkeley or anywhere else," Ted Hernandez, chairman of the Wiyot tribe, told CNN of the decision to give back the remains. "But people can learn from their mistakes and the new generation has been able to finally see why this was wrong."

The Wiyots lived on Northern California's Duluwat Island when White settlers massacred dozens of women, children and elders during an annual ceremony the tribe held in 1860, according to CNN.

The tribe, along with other Indigenous peoples, will have the remains of their ancestors returned as part of the university's compliance with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA).

"UC acknowledges that the injustices perpetrated on Native Hawaiians and Native Americans are reflected even to the present, and that as long as Human Remains and Cultural Items remain in the University's control, healing and reparation will be incomplete," the university said on its website.
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Sabrina Agarwal, bio-archaeologist and UC Berkeley NAGPRA Committee chair, told CNN that she hopes the return will "rebuild" relationships between Indigenous tribes and the museums and institutions that have held their belongings "without their consent for more than 100 years."

"This is part of restorative justice across the country. If we want to rebuild those relationships, repatriation is the first step," Agarwal said. "There can't be healing or rebuilding trust without repatriation."
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Hernandez told CNN that the decision is a step in the right direction when it comes to healing long-standing wounds felt by Indigenous tribes around the country.

"Those people who think this is not a big deal or doesn't matter: Imagine someone goes to your cemetery, digs up your ancestors, packs them in boxes and puts them on a shelf," he said. "Our ancestors should not be in boxes or on shelves, they should be home with their families."
RELATED VIDEO: University of Virginia Disenrolls Hundreds for Violating COVID-19 Vaccine Policy
UC Berkeley's NAGPRA committee, which is made up of three faculty members and three tribal community members, has so far returned at least 1,000 ancestral remains and more than 53,000 other items, Agarwal told CNN.

"We had our bad days with Berkeley when they didn't want to work with us, so we were definitely skeptical in the beginning, but I've seen the honesty coming from the staff today and how much they do want to help," Hernandez said. "We've been put through a lot. We were massacred, enslaved, and hunted. So trust is a hard word, but we're slowly getting there. It takes work."

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UC Berkeley Is Returning Thousands of Ancestral Remains to Indigenous People: 'Restorative Justice'

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Justin Sullivan/Getty UC Berkeley The remains of thousands of ancestors will be returned to Indigenous tribes by the University of California, Berkeley. "It wasn't right for past generations to dig up their remains and take them to Berkeley or anywhere else," Ted Hernandez, chairman of the Wiyot tribe, told CNN of the decision to give back the remains.

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Supreme Court refuses to hear St. Anne's residential school survivors' appeal

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Supreme Court refuses to hear St. Anne's residential school survivors' appeal

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I choose this article because in the text, Bobby talks about Residential Schools and how Indigenous people are still affected by them to this day.

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cbc.ca 1 day ago Brett Forester

Canada's top court has dismissed an appeal by survivors of a Catholic-run residential school near Fort Albany, Ont., in an ongoing dispute with the federal government over the impact of withheld documents on compensation claims.

The Supreme Court did not offer reasons Thursday morning when it rendered its decision not to hear from the group of St. Anne's survivors, unidentified in court documents but represented by author and former chief Edmund Metatawabin, who have been trying to have their cases reopened.

They contended there were "procedural and jurisdictional gaps" in the lower courts' handling of the case - which has unfolded under the residential schools class-action settlement - and asked the Supreme Court to intervene in a March 1 filing.

Evelyn Korkmaz, a St. Anne's survivor from Fort Albany, had mixed feelings the day before the decision: a sense of optimism tempered by a lack of faith in the Canadian court system.

"It's going to be a big day," Korkmaz said.

"Hopefully they have the courage to stand up for reconciliation and prove to us that they are going to stand alongside us and uphold our rights."

Regardless of the decision, the survivors have no plans to stop fighting, Korkmaz said.

"St. Anne's survivors are resilient. We've been fighting for years, and we're going to continue to fight," she said, suggesting they would take the campaign to the international level if the court refuses to hear the case.

"If they decide not to allow us to appeal, we'll have to pursue other avenues."

Korkmaz expressed disappointment following the dismissal.

"I can't see any other reason why Canada doesn't think that this is important enough for them to hear. The justice system does not work for Indigenous people of Canada," she said.

"Justice only exists in the dictionary. It doesn't exist in the justice system of Canada."

Timmins-James Bay New Democrat MP Charlie Angus, a longtime backer, announced the filing in a July news release, calling the move "a damning indictment of the Liberals' record on reconciliation."

The Liberal government, in competing filings, urged the court not to intervene.

Speaking outside the House of Commons on Wednesday, Angus said the decision would "be a really important moment" not just for the survivors, but reconciliation generally.

"All the talk of reconciliation gets blown out the door when you get to the case of St. Anne's," he said.

"This is a serious, serious issue for this government and for the principle of justice in Canada."

He too expressed disappointment in a statement shared Thursday morning.

"It is a sad day for justice in Canada that the Supreme Court has opted to trust the word of the government of Canada over the survivors," the statement said.

Government withheld OPP records

The Supreme Court hears only a slim fraction of the appeals filed with it. Last year, the bench granted eight per cent of the applications seeking leave to appeal, according to court statistics.

The legal dispute dates back to 2007, when the residential school compensation process began. The settlement agreement included a fixed payout for survivors and a claims adjudication mechanism, known as the Independent Assessment Process (IAP), for those who suffered extreme cases of abuse.

The deal required Canada to hand over relevant documents to accurately adjudicate IAP claims, yet the government withheld thousands of pages of provincial police records stemming from a mid-1990s probe into abuse at St. Anne's.

The judge administering the settlement "assumed this was done by mistake" and not deliberate deception, but the withholding of documents left some claimants questioning if they'd suffered yet another injustice.

The survivors aren't looking to have the documents handed over, which the judge ordered years ago, but want their compensation claims reassessed - this time with those records present.

St. Anne's survivors have recounted stories of harrowing sexual, physical and psychological abuse, including punishment via homemade electric chair and forcing ill pupils to eat their own vomit.

The police probe resulted in convictions for four former school staffers and one Indian Affairs employee on charges including indecent assault, assault causing bodily harm, assault and administering a noxious substance.

The group's push to have claims readjudicated eventually got Ottawa to strike a review.

Claiming St. Anne's advocates like Angus and Murray Sinclair were undermining trust in the settlement agreement, Crown-Indigenous Relations tapped retired judge Ian Pitfield to determine if the lack of disclosure impacted St. Anne's IAP claims.

Pitfield concluded Canada should revisit 11 specific cases involving allegations of student-on-student abuse. The government promised to do it.

In their brief to the Supreme Court, the survivors questioned the Pitfield report, claiming it was rendered without consulting claimants themselves and without rehearings by trained adjudicators.

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Supreme Court refuses to hear St. Anne's residential school survivors' appeal

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cbc.ca 1 day ago Brett Forester Canada's top court has dismissed an appeal by survivors of a Catholic-run residential school near Fort Albany, Ont., in an ongoing dispute with the federal government over the impact of withheld documents on compensation claims. The Supreme Court did not offer reasons Thursday morning when it rendered its decision not to hear from the group of St.

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I choose this story because Bobby's grandfather was at a Residential School and probably more of his family, he also may have lost family there.

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Indigenous Singer-Songwriter Donita Large Addresses Grief and Trauma of Canadian Residential Schools With “Reconciliation Sky” | Cashbox Canada

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A healing image of orange sunsets mixes with heavy grief on Indigenous blues singer/songwriter Donita Large’s soaring new single “Reconciliation Sky.” Inspired by the horrific 2021 news headlines that 215 unmarked graves had been uncovered at the Kamloops Residential School in British Columbia, Doni…