Editor's Note: My first family in Illinois, my dad's side, probably doesn't even know about this story and the ongoing tragedy, and the required NAGPRA repatriation of bone collections.
Why would Illinois have so many bones in collections? Really? Was it a money-making thing, people digging up my ancestor's graves? How exactly were these people "caring" for their bones? By leaving them in boxes? Charging money to see bones by displaying them? What kind of morbid sick people would do that?
Many of you who read this blog know terrorized Indigenous people moved and migrated west as more and more people flooded Turtle Island. When I was in southern Illinois, I was shocked to see so many of Virginia tribal names on various road signs. It's true Illinois was a landing place for tribes on the run from the growing and murdering colonizers. Murder? Oh God, yes. Read my book Almost Dead Indians and read about the scalp bounties. It's a horror story.
I get sad these looted bones are people who died tragically and now their names are lost. I get sad reading stories like this about Illinois. I get sad knowing that the people living there never questioned their own history. I get sad knowing people "hid" their identity as "Indian" out of fear but spoke about it in whispers to family members who would listen.
I get sad knowing tribes in Illinois also were forced to leave their homelands to escape.
-Blog Editor Trace L Hentz (adoptee)
ProPublica’s series published in that year identified how “America’s museums fail to return Native American human remains,” identifying how Illinois was one of the worst states for repatriation.
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