{"id":28932,"date":"2022-10-18T11:24:49","date_gmt":"2022-10-18T15:24:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indianz.com\/News\/?p=28932"},"modified":"2022-10-18T11:34:42","modified_gmt":"2022-10-18T15:34:42","slug":"underscore-news-yakama-nation-celebrates-return-of-sacred-land","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2022\/10\/18\/underscore-news-yakama-nation-celebrates-return-of-sacred-land\/","title":{"rendered":"Underscore.news: Yakama Nation celebrates return of sacred land"},"content":{"rendered":"\"Mount<\/a>
Mount Adams is seen from Trout Lake Highway in Klickitat County, Washington. Photo: pfly<\/a><\/figcaption>\r\n
\u2018Pahto Will Always be a Gift:\u2019 Yakama Nation Marks 50th Anniversary of Land Return<\/div>\r\n
An 1855 treaty with the U.S. government ensured one of the Yakama Nation\u2019s most important sites would remain a part of its homelands. The tribe just celebrated the decades-long effort fighting to see that promise kept.<\/div>\r\n
Tuesday, October 18, 2022<\/div>\r\n
By Chris Aadland<\/div>\r\n
Underscore News<\/a> and ICT<\/a><\/div>\r\n

<\/p> \r\nWHITE SWAN, Washington — Jim Thomas drew chuckles from the 200 or so gathered inside the White Swan Pavilion on the Yakama Indian Reservation with his practiced imitation of the low, raspy voice actor Marlon Brando used for his role in The Godfather. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThomas recalled how he convinced Brando to become a member of a committee working to resolve a land ownership dispute \u2014 and how Brando later, using his \u201cGodfather\u201d voice, told legendary newsman Walter Cronkite to meet face-to-face with Thomas and to \u201ctreat him with the same respect as you would with me.\u201d Cronkite listened, later highlighting Thomas\u2019 work on the Yakama land dispute during his evening news broadcast. \r\n

<\/p>\r\n\u201cWe got 15 minutes,\u201d Thomas said on September 23. \u201cNobody gets 15 minutes on a national program. We did.\u201d \r\n

<\/p> \r\n \"Jim<\/a>

Yakama Nation Indian Days royalty pose with Jim Thomas, Tlingit, after presenting him with a blanket given to him to honor him for his help during the tribe’s campaign to have the federal government honor promises it made when signing a treaty with the tribe in 1855 guaranteeing Mount Adams, one of the Yakama’s most important sites, was included in its reservation. Photo credit Andrea Tulee \/ Yakama Nation<\/figcaption>\r\n

<\/P>\r\nThomas is now a Tlingit elder whose career included working as a White House staff member, a spokesman for the National Congress of American Indians and starting his own Washington D.C.-based public relations office. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nBut reminiscing about Brando\u2019s legendary acting career and life wasn\u2019t what brought leaders and citizens of the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation together on Friday, September 23 with representatives of other Pacific Northwest tribes and non-Native community members. Nor had they come early for the tribe\u2019s annual National Indian Powwow, which would take place starting later on Friday afternoon and go through the weekend. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThey had come to commemorate the 50th anniversary of one of the first examples of a tribal nation reclaiming lost land: May 23, 1972, when President Richard Nixon signed an executive order returning to the Yakama Nation the eastern slope of the more than 12,200-foot tall volcanic Mount Adams \u2014 revered by the Yakama as one of its most important landmarks.\r\n

<\/p>\r\nMarlon Brando played only a supporting role. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThe tribe had spent decades fighting the federal government to honor a treaty that included the mountain, known as Pahto to the Yakamas, in its 1.3 million-acre reservation. \r\n

<\/p>\r\n\u201cWe\u2019re here today to recognize that every branch of government has affirmed once and for all, [that] Pahto will always be a gift from the creator,\u201d Yakama Nation Tribal Council Chairman Delano Saluskin said. \u201cThis land is ours and it will always be ours.\u201d\r\n

<\/p>\r\nBefore signing the land cession treaty that included Mt. Adams, Yakama homelands spanned millions of acres. On Pahto, the people of the Yakama Nation, a confederacy of 14 tribes and bands, could find plentiful roots, berries, nuts and game, while the annual snowmelt nourished the surrounding land. Culturally, the mountain is significant, too. According to tribal legends, Pahto is one of five sisters who comprise the Yakama Nation\u2019s five sacred mountains. \r\n

<\/p>\r\n\"Makah<\/a>

Makah Tribe drummers sing as Makah youth dance behind them as part of a 50th anniversary commemoration for the return of Mount Adams — which is painted on the building’s wall in the background — to the Yakama Nation. Photo by Chris Aadland \/ Underscore News<\/figcaption> \r\n

<\/P>\r\nIn the late 1800s, surveying errors and misplaced treaty maps are allegedly what caused the government to include more than 120,000 acres of Yakama land in the Mount Rainier Forest Reserve. In 1908, the land became part of what is now known as the Gifford Pinchot National Forest.\r\n

<\/p>\r\nWhile a 1966 federal Indian Claims Commission ruling found that the land was rightfully part of the Yakama Reservation, the U.S. government refused to return the land, agreeing only to a monetary settlement. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThat was unacceptable, said Thomas, who played an important role after Yakama leaders asked him to help organize the land return effort and act as a spokesman for the tribe during the effort. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nAs the White House continued to resist returning the land, Thomas and the tribe, led by then-Chairman Robert Jim, convinced Brando of the injustice the Yakama people were struggling against. Thomas said the tribe was invited to appear on some of the country\u2019s most widely watched TV programs, like the Today Show. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThat public spotlight, plus pressure and support from U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy, and the persistence of Yakama leaders who would accept nothing less than the government keeping the promises it made in the 1855 treaty, culminated in Nixon finally agreeing to issue his executive order. Thomas said it took 14 months from the time he and other tribal leaders ramped up their public pressure campaign seeking the return of Pahto. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThomas said the struggle shows Yakama and Indigenous youth that they don\u2019t have to settle for less than what their rights. \r\n

<\/p>\r\n\u201cWhen they go up against that man from Europe, they can speak with authority and speak with the strength of a mountain behind them because it\u2019s theirs,\u201d he said. \r\n

<\/p>\r\n \"Native<\/a>

Yakama Nation military veterans mark the beginning of a public celebration at the tribe’s White Swan Pavillion marking the 50th anniversary of the tribe successfully reclaiming Mount Adams — or Pahto — from the federal government after it was incorrectly excluded from the reservation’s boundaries. Photo credit Andrea Tulee \/ Yakama Nation<\/figcaption>\r\n\r\n

<\/P>\r\n

\u2018There will always be that beautiful mountain\u2019<\/div>\r\n \r\nThe actual anniversary of the executive order<\/a> was exactly four months before the September 23 commemoration. The celebration included drumming, dancing by Yakama youth and young dancers from the Makah Nation and speeches from tribal leaders and others, like Thomas, who played a role in the fight. Attendees enjoyed a meal of salmon, venison, huckleberries, corn and pumpkin pie ahead of the tribe\u2019s annual National Indian Days opening ceremonies and powwow. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nThe celebration could have been marked by a more uncertain mood. Klickitat County, which has borders that overlap with the Yakama reservation, tried to convince the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case where it argued that Pahto and 121,000 acres of reservation land known as Tract D were incorrectly included in the reservation\u2019s boundaries and should instead be owned by the state of Washington. \r\n

<\/p>\r\nEarlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld previous court rulings in favor of the Yakama Nation, declining to hear the case and affirming that the mountain and rest of Tract D was correctly included in the reservation\u2019s boundaries. \r\n

<\/p>\r\n\u201cDespite President Nixon\u2019s proclamation, Klickitat County still tried to rewrite history,\u201d Saluskin said. \r\n

<\/p>

<\/ins>