Wendell George: Native Americans show respect for gravesites

For untold generations, stories circulated about our ancestors’ campgrounds in East Wenatchee. My dad, Moses, felt drawn there, so we moved to Grant Road and Kentucky Street. Much later, in 1987, 13,000-year-old Clovis spear points were discovered near Grant Road. The find included mammoth bone tools and evidence of giant sloths, camels, large bison and mastodon now extinct. The descendants of those people survived just like the Native Americans of today. Are they related?

The Colville Tribes staged a peaceful demonstration in October 1990 at the Clovis site to protest the dig. All deposits like that are sacred to us, not just graves. The dig was eventually stopped, but this highlighted the cultural difference between Native Americans and the dominant society.

We are very sensitive to this because there have been many Native American grave sites raided for souvenirs. In the 1890s, my great-grandfather, Chilcosahaskt, had to move his family’s graves from Orondo to Entiat to protect them. An Indian skull collection was proudly shown in the Aug. 12, 1954, Wenatchee World. A video about a New Zealand museum showed Chief Moses’ personal items that had been buried with him. We retrieved many remains of our people from the Smithsonian and gave them a proper burial.