The Muscogee Nation

Tag: National Parks Service

  • Ocmulgee National Monument working toward expansion

    Ocmulgee National Monument working toward expansion

    by: Amanda Rutland/MCNPR

    MACON, Ga. — The National Parks Service Ocmulgee National Monument in Macon, Ga. has been working for several years to expand the park boundaries. Currently, the Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park Boundary Revision Act (H.R. 538) has passed the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate Committee and waits voting by the Senate.

    Ocmulgee National Monument Superintendent Jim David said the bill would expand the park from 702 acres to almost 3,000 acres and it would protect important archeological areas along the Ocmulgee River in Georgia.

    “The plateau here where the mounds are located this is where the leaders of the society lived, but the worker bees, the folks growing the corn, making the pottery, making the baskets, etc. They all lived down around the river in the flat land and that is what we are trying to preserve and protect,” David said.

    The property is currently privately owned and as private property the landowners could develop it without intervention.

    “It is their property they can do whatever they want with it regardless of how much damage it does to a cultural site and since that is a very big part of the story we want to preserve that, and that is homeland of the Muscogee Nation and having that protected forever will mean that property will not be destroyed or torn up, etc.,” David said.

    David said the bill is not controversial because all the landowners are willing to sell.

    “The landowners who we will be buying the land from, I have talked with all of them. They are all willing sellers, so we are not going to use imminent domain or condemnation,” David said.

    Congressman Sanford D. Bishop, Jr. (GA-02) said in a press release that the Ocmulgee Mounds are a cultural and archeological treasure.

    “The site of these historic mounds has been inhabited continuously for over 17,000 years, and the ceremonial mounds and earth-lodges that exist today were built over 1,000 years ago. House passage of this legislation is a win for historic preservation and a win for Middle Georgia. I thank all those that have helped push this bill across the finish line here in the House, and I encourage my colleagues in the Senate to follow suit by enacting this legislation into law as swiftly as possible,” Bishop said.

    The passage of the bill would not only expand the park, but also change the name of the park to the Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park.

    “We added the word mounds because we have a big identity problem here in town,” David said. “For generations now everyone calls this place the Indian Mounds. They have no idea of the real name.”

    The local government, economic development groups and visitor center as well as the Inter-Tribal Council of the Five Civilized Tribes support the expansion.

  • Muscogee (Creek) Nation and National Parks Service bring ancestors home

    PRESS RELEASE

     

    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
    August 30, 2017

    CONTACT Neely Tsoodle
    PR Manager
    P.O. Box 580
    Okmulgee, OK 74447
    (918) 758-6599
    NTsoodle@muscogeenation.com

    Muscogee (Creek) Nation, National Parks Service bring ancestors home

    MACON, Ga. — The Muscogee (Creek) Nation took part in a repatriation ceremony on Aug. 30 to return more than one hundred ancestors to their homeland at the Ocmulgee National Monument in Macon, GA. This is the largest repatriation the tribe and the National Park Service at the Ocmulgee National Monument have ever seen.

    The remains of 113 people and more than 42-thousand funerary objects were returned to what historians, tribal and cultural leaders called “sacred ground” during a private ceremony at an undisclosed and secured area at the park.

    NPS along with tribal cultural leaders from Muskogean tribes from Oklahoma and Florida have worked on the repatriation for more than 15 years. In 2005, the MCN requested the return of the remains and funerary objects from the Smithsonian.

    Many of the remains were separated after archeologists removed them from the site around 1930 during one of the largest archeological digs in U.S. History. In 1990, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) passed and allowed tribes to reclaim ancestral human remains and objects.

    NPS Superintendent Jim David has worked at the Ocmulgee National Monument for 20 years and it has been one of his largest goals to see the remains, along with their possessions, placed back in their rightful place.

    “To see something that I’ve been dreaming of that I’ve been hoping for this long? It got to me, I got very emotional,” said David. “I am not an archeologist, but to me having these human beings sitting in museum drawers, museum boxes, to me makes no sense whatsoever. These people need to be back in the earth where they came from, probably never should have been removed to begin with.”

    MCN Historic and Cultural Preservation Manager RaeLynn Butler echoed David’s sentiment.

    “There’s so many of our ancestors on shelves. It’s important that in a respectful way we put them back where they belong,” Butler said.

    Butler said the repatriation was about reuniting ancestors with their possessions as they complete their journey.

    “Loved ones are buried with some of their favorite possessions that were important to them, “ said Butler. “It’s not necessarily to bring them back to Oklahoma, but to put them back from where they were taken from. As tribes, we feel it is our job of historic preservation to make sure we are protecting our resources and our sacred ground and artifacts. We felt the tribes should be the lead on how this would happen,” said Butler.

    Members of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation National Council, Second Chief Louis Hicks, Seminole Nation of Oklahoma and Florida, Thlopthlocco Tribal Town and Kialegee Tribal Town representatives were all present for the ceremony.