Late Indiana man's home filled with Indian artifacts and bones, apparently scored through grave-robbing - Entrepreneur Generations

Thousands of Native American items, including the bones of about 500 people, were among the artifacts authorities removed from the home of a rural Indiana man who died at age 90. Don Miller, who lived in the town of Waldron, was well-known for his love of collecting souvenirs from his global travels. But many items appear to have been illegally obtained through grave-robbing, Anna Werner reports for CBS News.

Though Miller died in 2014, agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation are still trying to return the items to their rightful owners. Holly Cusack-McVeigh, an archaeology professor from Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, has been helping them. She calls the grave-robbing a racist act: "We have to think about the context of, 'Who has been the target of graverobbing, for centuries?" Whose ancestors have been collected for hobby?" she told Werner. "This comes down to — racism. They aren't digging white graves."

Arikara tribal official Pete Coffey in North Dakota is working with the FBI to bring some of the remains back to tribal land. "They could very well be my own great, great, great, great grandfather, or grandmother, you know, that had been — I characterize it as being ripped out of the Earth, you know," Coffey told Werner.

from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/2tTcnU9 Late Indiana man's home filled with Indian artifacts and bones, apparently scored through grave-robbing - Entrepreneur Generations

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