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[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 40 (Wednesday, February 28, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 14710-14711]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2024-04091]

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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

National Park Service

[NPS-WASO-NAGPRA-NPS0037477; PPWOCRADN0-PCU00RP14.R50000]

Notice of Inventory Completion: University of California, 
Riverside, Riverside, CA

AGENCY: National Park Service, Interior.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: In accordance with the Native American Graves Protection and 
Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), the University of California, Riverside has 
completed an inventory of human remains and associated funerary objects 
and has determined that there is a cultural affiliation between the 
human remains and associated funerary objects and Indian Tribes or 
Native Hawaiian organizations in this notice. The human remains and 
associated funerary objects were removed from an unknown county in CA.

DATES: Repatriation of the human remains and associated funerary 
objects in this notice may occur on or after March 29, 2024.

ADDRESSES: Megan Murphy, University of California, Riverside, 900 
University Avenue, Riverside, CA 92517-5900, telephone (951) 827-6349, 
email [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This notice is published as part of the 
National Park Service's administrative responsibilities under NAGPRA. 
The determinations in this notice are the sole responsibility of the 
University of California, Riverside. The National Park Service is not 
responsible for the determinations in this notice. Additional 
information on the determinations in this notice, including the results 
of consultation, can be found in the inventory or related records held 
by the University of California, Riverside.

Description

    Human remains representing, at minimum, one individual were removed 
from an unknown County in CA. The V. Basinger Collection is believed to 
have been donated to the University of California, Riverside in the 
1960s. The collection is approximately 28 banker's boxes in size and 
contains about 600 items. The cremated remains of at least one Native 
American ancestor are housed in six clay vessels in the collection. In 
his 2002 NAGPRA inventory, Dr. Phil Wilke of the UCR Anthropology 
Department, noted that the collection had been in the department since 
at least 1969. Through archival research, NAGPRA Staff uncovered 
information related to a professor of entomology, Dr. Almon Jay 
Basinger, who taught at UCR from 1923-196. Dr. Basinger was married to 
Vera Basinger (Lewis) who passed away in 1950. According to historical 
census data, Vera Basinger lived in Pima County, AZ, in her early life 
on her family's farm. NAGPRA Program Staff believe that the V. Basinger 
Collection was composed mostly of Vera's personal collection and was 
donated by Dr. Almon Basinger to UCR after her death. Collection 
records list Arizona (Gila Bend, Rillito, Chiricahua Mountains) and 
Riverside, California for small a portion of the collection, while the 
rest is broadly un-provenienced. In a student paper likely from the 
1970s, a student conducted an osteological analysis of the cremated 
remains yielding information about the possible method of cremation and 
noting that the individual was a young, Native American man from the 
``Southern California desert''. The only documentation associated with 
the collection was a singular black and white photograph of four people 
washing pottery at what appears to be an archeological site. Writing on 
the reverse of the photograph appears to read ``Washing pottery at 
Puy[eacute], 1916 New Mexico''. The items in the collection seem to be 
from different locales in the American Southwest and Southern 
California and are not all from the burial site where the cremation was 
reportedly removed from. The burial site was likely in either 
Riverside, Imperial, San Diego, or San Bernardino Counties. Through 
consultation and review of the funerary objects with various southern 
California/Arizona Tribes it was determined that the individual was 
most likely either Cahuilla or Yaqui. The six associated funerary 
objects are six clay vessels (ollas).

Cultural Affiliation

    The human remains and associated funerary objects in this notice 
are connected to one or more identifiable earlier groups, tribes, 
peoples, or cultures. There is a relationship of shared group identity 
between the identifiable earlier groups, tribes, peoples, or cultures 
and one or more Indian Tribes or Native Hawaiian organizations. The 
following types of information were used to reasonably trace the 
relationship: geographical information, historical information, and 
expert tribal opinion.

Determinations

    Pursuant to NAGPRA and its implementing regulations, and after 
consultation with the appropriate Indian Tribes and Native Hawaiian 
organizations, the University of California, Riverside has determined 
that:
     The human remains described in this notice represent the 
physical remains of one individual of Native American ancestry.
     The six objects described in this notice are reasonably 
believed to have

[[Page 14711]]

been placed with or near individual human remains at the time of death 
or later as part of the death rite or ceremony.
     There is a relationship of shared group identity that can 
be reasonably traced between the human remains and associated funerary 
objects described in this notice and the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla 
Indians of the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation, California; Augustine 
Band of Cahuilla Indians, California; Cabazon Band of Cahuilla Indians 
(previously listed as Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, California); 
Cahuilla Band of Indians; Chemehuevi Indian Tribe of the Chemehuevi 
Reservation, California; Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla and Cupeno 
Indians, California; Morongo Band of Mission Indians, California; 
Pascua Yaqui Tribe of Arizona; Ramona Band of Cahuilla, California; 
Santa Rosa Band of Cahuilla Indians, California; Torres Martinez Desert 
Cahuilla Indians, California; and the Twenty-Nine Palms Band of Mission 
Indians of California.

Requests for Repatriation

    Written requests for repatriation of the human remains and 
associated funerary objects in this notice must be sent to the 
Responsible Official identified in ADDRESSES. Requests for repatriation 
may be submitted by:
    1. Any one or more of the Indian Tribes or Native Hawaiian 
organizations identified in this notice.
    2. Any lineal descendant, Indian Tribe, or Native Hawaiian 
organization not identified in this notice who shows, by a 
preponderance of the evidence, that the requestor is a lineal 
descendant or a culturally affiliated Indian Tribe or Native Hawaiian 
organization.
    Repatriation of the human remains and associated funerary objects 
in this notice to a requestor may occur on or after March 29, 2024. If 
competing requests for repatriation are received, the University of 
California, Riverside must determine the most appropriate requestor 
prior to repatriation. Requests for joint repatriation of the human 
remains and associated funerary objects are considered a single request 
and not competing requests. The University of California, Riverside is 
responsible for sending a copy of this notice to the Indian Tribes and 
Native Hawaiian organizations identified in this notice.
    This notice was submitted before the effective date of the revised 
regulations (88 FR 86452, December 13, 2023, effective January 12, 
2024). As the notice conforms to the mandatory format of the Federal 
Register and includes the required information, the National Park 
Service is publishing this notice as submitted.
    Authority: Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, 
25 U.S.C. 3003, and the implementing regulations, 43 CFR 10.10.

    Dated: February 20, 2024.
Melanie O'Brien,
Manager, National NAGPRA Program.
[FR Doc. 2024-04091 Filed 2-27-24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4312-52-P
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