JACKSON, Wyo. — Human remains of native Alaskans taken by Olaus Murie in 1936 and found in a closet at the Teton Science School in 2021 are now logged and open for repatriation requests, according to a Federal Register notice.
The remains are currently being stored at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Museum of the North, Regional Archaeologist and Historic Preservation Officer for U.S Fish & Wildlife Service, Alaska Region (FWS Alaska), Jeremy M. Karchut confirmed in an email with Buckrail.
The remains were donated along with a larger collection amassed by Murie to Teton Science School in 1973, by Murie’s brother Adolph and his wife Louise Murie.
Sometime between 1973 and 2021, the human remains from the collection went “missing” within the organization. A graduate student allegedly discovered the items in 2021 within “a storage closet on the premises of the Murie Museum, located on the Kelly Campus,” Teton Science School confirmed in an email with Buckrail.
In a statement published on the Teton Science School website on Aug.14, the school said they immediately sought outside expertise once the remains were discovered and hired Bernstein and Associates, a Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) consultant firm. The NAGPRA is a 1990 law that was created to return certain Native American remains, funerary objects, sacred objects and items of cultural patrimony to descendants or tribal nations from federally funded universities and museums.
“Murie removed human remains, representing, at a minimum three individuals from ‘Mummy Cave’—likely Cold Cave, Warm Cave or Mask Cave—on Kagamil Island,” says the federal register notice. No associated funerary objects were found in Murie’s collection.
In an email to Buckrail, Karchut confirmed that the items are two crania and a single mandible.
Murie was a conservationist and ecologist who is credited with being a foundational part of the creation of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the 1964 Wilderness Act, created a year after his death. He moved to Jackson Hole in 1927 to direct field studies on elk herds and was an advocate for the ecological balance of wildlife. The ranch he established with his wife became the headquarters of the Wilderness Society and sits within what is now Grand Teton National Park. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2006 and became a campus of the Teton Science School in 2015.
Kagamil Island is located in the Aleutian Islands off of Alaska. Kagamil is part of the “Islands of Four Mountains” which includes Amukta, Chagulak, Yunaska, Herbert, Carlisle, Chuginadak and Uliaga Islands. These islands currently have no permanent population.
“The FWS has determined that the remains are believed to be associated with modern-day populations on Umnak Island in the Aleutian Island chain,” Karchut said. “Nikolski is the only remaining Alaska Native community on the island.”
According to the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association, Nikolski is thought to be the oldest continuously occupied community in the world with archaeological evidence from Ananiuliak Island, five km offshore in Nikolski Bay, dating human habitation to 8,500 years ago. According to Britannica, the indigenous people of the Aleutian Islands, the Unangan or Unangax (Russian fur traders called them Aleuts), arrived in the Aleutian Islands from the Alaskan mainland.
“The FWS Alaska Region has been attempting to contact the Native Village of Nikolski since last spring to let them know about the Federal Register Notice publication,” Karchut said. “Sometimes this can be a lengthy process, particularly when working with tiny, remote communities with limited phone and internet access.”
Tribes are not required to make a claim for repatriation under NAGPRA, but Karchut said the agency will continue to attempt to contact the Tribe “and assist them however we can if they do wish to make a claim and request the return of these ancestors.”
The FWS Alaska and the Department of the Interior, along with help from the University of Alaska Museum of the North and the Museum of the Aleutians, completed the inventory of the items discovered at Teton Science School, along with six other human remains collections taken from Kagamil Island, Carlisle Island and Ship Rock Island between 1936 and 1948. Remains from a total of 13 individuals and 148 funerary objects were inventoried.
Funerary objects include items like bones, kayak parts, pumice samples, hides, grass bundles, etc. and were placed “with or near an individual human remains at the time of death or later, as part of the death rite or ceremony.”
“At that time, [collecting human remains] was sort of a practice in anthropology,” said Dr. Joshua Reuther, Curator of Archaeology/Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Museum of the North. “We have different practices nowadays, and are sort of struggling with that history in our discipline and in a way face those practices that aren’t acceptable today through repatriation.”
Reuther explained that the repatriation process can take time, but the Museum of the North will provide support throughout.
“We are trying to confront the problems in our discipline and this is kind of one of those ways, by supporting repatriation respectfully,” Reuther said.
According to the Federal Register, responses to requests for repatriation began on May 17.
“To conduct the process with dignity and respect, we refrained from issuing a public statement during the initial discovery and contact phase with consultants and state and federal agencies,” Teton Science School said in a statement.
