[Federal Register Volume 65, Number 89 (Monday, May 8, 2000)]
[Notices]
[Pages 26629-26630]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 00-11378]


-----------------------------------------------------------------------

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

National Park Service


Notice of Intent to Repatriate Cultural Items from the Nevada 
Test Site, NV in the Possession of the Nevada Operations Office, U.S. 
Department of Energy, Las Vegas, NV

AGENCY: National Park Service, Interior.

ACTION: Notice.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

    Notice is hereby given under the Native American Graves Protection 
and Repatriation Act, 43 CFR 10.10 (a)(3), of the intent to repatriate 
cultural items

[[Page 26630]]

from the Nevada Test Site, NV in the possession of the Nevada 
Operations Office, U.S. Department of Energy, Las Vegas, NV which meet 
the definition of ``sacred object'' and ``unassociated funerary 
object'' under Section 2 of the Act.
    The 46 cultural items consist of ceramics, groundstones, bone and 
glass beads, stone pendants, projectile points, white chert, abrader, 
pestle, chipped stone, and a bowl.
    These 46 cultural items were recovered in the same vicinities where 
Native American burials had previously been recovered. Consultation 
evidence presented by representatives of Western Shoshone and Paiute 
tribes indicates these cultural items are consistent with funerary 
objects typically included in Western Shoshone and Paiute burials.
    The 274 cultural items consist of bone and glass beads, 
groundstone, projectile points and fragments, pieces of pottery, 
ceramics, obsidian bifaces, white chert, abraders, basketry, a bowl, a 
stone knife, a stone drill, crystals, pipe fragments, cores, and stone 
pendants/ornaments.
    Consultation evidence presented by representatives of Western 
Shoshone and Paiute tribes indicates these 250 cultural items are 
specific ceremonial objects needed by Native American traditional 
religious leaders for the practice of Native American religion by 
present-day adherents.
    Between 1965-1969, these cultural items were recovered from several 
sites within the Nevada Test site during non-legally permitted 
collections by Frederick Worman, and anthropologist and biologist with 
the Los Alamos National Laboratory and William McKinnis, an engineer 
with the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. These collections also 
include cultural items from within the Nevada Test site given to 
McKinnis by other unknown collectors. After 1969, these collections 
were curated at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas until 1983, when 
they were transferred to the Desert Research Institute (DRI), a federal 
curation facility, in Reno, NV. When the collections containing these 
cultural items were inventoried in 1996, if was found that there was 
not any systematic referencing system, making it difficult to assign 
materials to their original locations within the Nevada Test site.
    Based on the above-mentioned information, officials of the U.S. 
Department of Energy have determined that, pursuant to 43 CFR 10.2 
(d)(2)(ii), these 46 cultural items are reasonably believed to have 
been placed with or near individual human remains at the time of death 
or later as part of the death rite or ceremony and are believed, by a 
preponderance of the evidence, to have been removed from a specific 
burial site of an Native American individual. Officials of the U.S. 
Department of Energy have determined that, pursuant to 43 CFR 10.2 
(d)(3), these 274 cultural items are specific ceremonial objects needed 
by traditional Native American religious leaders for the practice of 
traditional Native American religions by their present-day adherents. 
Officials of the U.S. Department of Energy have also determined that, 
pursuant to 43 CFR 10.2 (e), there is a relationship of shared group 
identity which can be reasonably traced between these items and the 
Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah, the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe of the 
Chemehuevi Reservation, the Colorado River Indian Tribes of the 
Colorado Indian Reservation, the Duckwater Shoshone Tribe of the 
Duckwater Reservation, the Ely Shoshone Tribe of Nevada, the Fort 
Independence Indian Community of Paiute Indians of the Fort 
Independence Reservation, the Las Vegas Tribe of Paiute Indians of the 
Las Vegas Indian Colony, the Kaibab Band of Paiute Indians of the 
Kaibab Indian Reservation, the Moapa Band of Paiute Indians of the 
Moapa River Indian Reservation, the Paiute-Shoshone Indians of the Lone 
Pine Community of the Lone Pine Reservation, and the Yomba Shoshone 
Tribe of the Yomba Reservation.
    This notice has been sent to officials of the Paiute Indian Tribe 
of Utah, the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe of the Chemehuevi Reservation, the 
Colorado River Indian Tribes of the Colorado Indian Reservation, the 
Duckwater Shoshone Tribe of the Duckwater Reservation, the Ely Shoshone 
Tribe of Nevada, the Fort Independence Indian Community of Paiute 
Indians of the Fort Independence Reservation, the Las Vegas Tribe of 
Paiute Indians of the Las Vegas Indian Colony, the Kaibab Band of 
Paiute Indians of the Kaibab Indian Reservation, the Moapa Band of 
Paiute Indians of the Moapa River Indian Reservation, the Paiute-
Shoshone Indians of the Lone Pine Community of the Lone Pine 
Reservation, the Yomba Shoshone Tribe of the Yomba Reservation and the 
following non-Federally recognized Indian groups: the Timbisha Shoshone 
Tribe, the Pahrump Paiute Tribe, the Las Vegas Indian Center, the 
Southern Paiute Tribal Chairman's Associated, and the Owens Valley 
Board of Trustees. Representatives of any other Indian tribe that 
believes itself to be culturally affiliated with these objects should 
contact Robert C. Furlow, NAGPRA Program Manager, DOE Nevada Operations 
Office, PO Box 98518, Las Vegas, NV 89193-8518; telephone: (762) 295-
0845, fax: (762) 295-1455 before June 7, 2000. Repatriation of these 
objects to the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah, the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe 
of the Chemehuevi Reservation, the Colorado River Indian Tribes of the 
Colorado Indian Reservation, the Duckwater Shoshone Tribe of the 
Duckwater Reservation, the Ely Shoshone Tribe of Nevada, the Fort 
Independence Indian Community of Paiute Indians of the Fort 
Independence Reservation, the Las Vegas Tribe of Paiute Indians of the 
Las Vegas Indian Colony, the Kaibab Band of Paiute Indians of the 
Kaibab Indian Reservation, the Moapa Band of Paiute Indians of the 
Moapa River Indian Reservation, the Paiute-Shoshone Indians of the Lone 
Pine Community of the Lone Pine Reservation, and the Yomba Shoshone 
Tribe of the Yomba Reservation may begin after that date if no 
additional claimants come forward.
    The National Park Service is not responsible for the determinations 
within this notice.

    Dated: April 26, 2000.
Veletta Canouts,
Acting Deparmental Consulting Archeologist,
Deputy Manager, Archeology and Ethnography Program.
[FR Doc. 00-11378 Filed 5-5-00; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4310-70-F