January 19, 2012

Majority Of Native American Remains In Museums

Will Likely Be Returned To Descendants

Berkeley, CA (AP) — On a bluff overlooking a sweep of Southern California beach, scientists in 1976 unearthed what were among the oldest skeletal remains ever found in the Western Hemisphere.

Researchers would come to herald the bones — dating back nearly 10,000 years — as a potential treasure trove for understanding the earliest human history of the continental United States. But a local tribal group called the Kumeyaay Nation claimed that the bones, representing at least two people, were their ancestors and demanded them back several years ago.

For decades, fights like this over the provenance and treatment of human bones have played out across the nation. Yet new federal protections could mean that the vast majority of the remains of an estimated 160,000 Native Americans held by universities, museums and federal government agencies, including those sought by the Kumeyaay, may soon be transferred to tribes.

A recent federal regulation addresses what should happen to any remains that cannot be positively traced to the ancestors of modern-day tribes. Museums and agencies are required to notify tribes whose current or ancestral lands harbored the remains, then the tribe is entitled to have them back.

Prestigious institutions from Harvard to the University of California, Berkeley have already begun working through storehouses of remains uncovered by archeologists, highway and building contractors and others since the 19th Century. A few are surrendering bones to Native tribes, and others are evaluating whether to do so.

Tribes have hailed the rule, saying it will help close a long and painful chapter that saw native peoples’ bones stolen by grave robbers, boxed up in dusty storerooms and disrespected by researchers.

“Darn it, these are people,” said Louis Guassac, a member of the Kumeyaay Cultural Repatriation Committee. “This isn’t stuff. You don’t do this to people. I don’t care how long they’ve been there. You respect them.”

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 provided for the return of remains connected to modern-day tribes. But it was not until 2010 that a rule on the disposition of so-called culturally unidentifiable remains was finalized by the Department of the Interior. Until then, more than 650 universities and other institutions had no clear guidance about how to return those remains, which account for the bones of about 116,000 people in their collections. That rule is still playing out, sometimes fractiously.

Ishi, the last surviving Yahi tribesman (c) 1911

Universities find themselves tugged one way by the law’s mandates, another by faculty research needs.

Some anthropologists say more remains will become off limits, imperiling study of the diets, health, migrations and other habits of ancient peoples without guaranteeing that the remains will wind up with their true descendants. “There really isn’t any balance anymore,” said Keith Kintigh, associate director of the School of Human Evolution and Social Change at Arizona State University. “The public and scientific interest in (the remains) no longer have any weight.”

In recent months, Harvard’s Peabody Museum has received requests for about 500 remains and hired additional staff as they respond to the 2010 rule, said Patricia Capone, the museum’s repatriation coordinator.

At the University of Michigan, officials have decided to transfer the bulk of their 1,580 culturally unaffiliated remains to 13 Native American tribes who want them. In the meantime, they have been put off limits to researchers. “The law is very clear that they will be transferred,” said school spokesman Rick Fitzgerald.

At UC-Berkeley, more than 6,000 of the roughly 10,000 remains that were deemed culturally unidentifiable are now subject to potential transfer to tribes. And the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Archaeology here has added four new staff members to help match remains to tribes if possible and notify tribes whose lands held the remains.

The small, eclectic museum recently celebrated the 100th anniversary of a recording made by Ishi — the last surviving member of the Yahi tribe who emerged from hiding in Northern California in 1911. The museum displays artifacts such as Pomo baskets, an Achumawi rabbit-skin blanket and arrowheads Ishi made out of obsidian and glass— but not the remains of native peoples.

The collection of bones —one of the country’s largest — is in storage. Officials declined to show them to The Associated Press during a recent campus visit on grounds that that could be offensive to tribes.

The university currently has four pending requests for remains. And Museum Director Mari Lyn Salvador said the regulation change has caused concern among researchers.

“There are very important opportunities to understand contemporary medicine ... information that could be very useful to these (Native) communities themselves in terms of better understanding diabetes and other illnesses,” she said.

The university presents such information to tribes, she said, but lets the tribes decide whether to allow researchers to work with the bones.

Tens of thousands of individual Native American remains have been collected since the mid-19th century. Some grave sites were looted or excavated to support scientific research, including a study of skulls purporting to show that Native Americans were inferior to Caucasians, according to Robert Bieder, an Indiana University professor who has written about the phenomenon.

The bones in dispute at UC San Diego have long since been out of the ground. They were excavated more than three decades ago from land around the university chancellor’s house in La Jolla by a professor from another school. But a photo of the original discovery shows the outlines of two skeletons with skulls, buried head to toe.

Since their discovery in 1976, they have been studied at the Smithsonian and carbon dated at the University of Oxford, according to Margaret Schoeninger, a professor in the Department of Anthropology at UCSD and the university’s representative on Indian burial issues.

When the Kumeyaay Nation — a dozen native bands with reservations in San Diego County — first demanded the remains, the university rejected its claim that they were the tribe’s ancestors.

Researchers have said Kumeyaay remains were cremated early in the tribe’s history, not buried. They have also questioned whether the remains are even Native American, given their age, although the university has concluded that they are.

“In terms of what the Kumeyaay have put forward, the only thing I’ve heard is their belief, their deep tie to the land and folklore,” Schoeninger said. “We need empirical evidence.”

Tribal representatives say they have an oral history that goes back thousands of years and connects them to the remains.

In light of the recent rule, university officials did a reevaluation, concluding that the skeletons came from the Kumeyaay’s ancestral lands while still maintaining they were not the Kumeyaay’s direct ancestors.

In a filing in December, the university said it would turn the remains over to the Kumeyaay although it gave other tribal groups until Jan. 4 to come forward and dispute the Kumeyaay’s claim.

Kumeyaay repatriation officials say they will accept the remains.

“The Greatest” Had A Big Day This Week:

Fighter Muhammad Ali Turned 70

by Tim Dalhberg

AP Sports

(AP) ``Rumble, young man, rumble,’’ used to be his battle cry.

But Muhammad Ali is an old man now, ravaged by his years in the ring and his decades of braving Parkinson’s disease. The voice that used to bellow that he was ``The Greatest’’ is largely muted now, save for those times in the mornings when he is able to whisper his thoughts.

The face, though, is still that of the most recognizable man on earth. Maybe not as finely chiseled as it was in his prime, but close enough.

``It’s not like he doesn’t look like himself,’’ said his oldest daughter, Maryum ``May May’’ Ali. ``It’s the same face, the Parkinson’s hasn’t affected that.’’’

Ali turned 70 on Tuesday, giving Baby Boomers who grew up with him one more reason to reflect on their own advancing years.
He’s fought Parkinson’s the way he fought the late Joe Frazier, never giving an inch. But it’s a fight he can’t win, and nearly 30 years of living with it has taken a heavy toll.

His days at home with wife, Lonnie, in a gated community near Phoenix, generally follow the same routine: He gets out of bed and takes a shower before easing into his favorite chair for long hours at a time.

Muhammad Ali took down Sonny Liston in 1965

Sometimes he will watch videos of his old fights. The hands will move, eyes will twitch, as he remembers the magnificent fighter and physical specimen he once was.

``I always say the only person who likes to watch old Muhammad Ali fights more than me is him,’’ said John Ramsey, a Louisville radio and television personality who has been a close friend of Ali’s for more than 30 years. ``His memory is better than mine and he’s very sharp. His sense of humor is still there, too.’’

Through it all he remains a proud man. There are no complaints. No time spent bemoaning his fate.
It is, the devout Muslim would say, God’s will.

``He would always just say to his family, `These are the cards I was dealt, so don’t be sad,’’’ Maryum Ali said. ``He never played the victim. There was never any `Woe is me.’’’

That he is still alive so long after being diagnosed with the degenerative disease may be a tribute to the athleticism and inner strength that helped him stop Frazier on a brutally hot morning in the Philippines and helped him knock out the fearsome George Foreman in Africa. Among the heavyweights of his generation he was a big man, standing 6-foot-2 and usually weighing in at around 210 pounds.

He’s stooped now and weighs much less. But his arms are those of a younger man, and his body still shows signs of the magnificent sculpting of days gone by. Every Sunday, his doctor in Phoenix makes a house call to make sure he’s doing OK.
There are medications to help relieve his symptoms; there is no cure for Parkinson’s.

``The Parkinson’s has affected him a lot, one of things he has is a lot of difficulty speaking,’’ said Dr. Abraham Lieberman, director of the Muhammad Ali Parkinson’s Center in Phoenix. ``But he’s never downbeat about it. He’s a tremendous inspiration to everyone.’’
In November, a few days after he traveled to Philadelphia to say goodbye to Frazier, Ali was rushed to a Phoenix-area hospital. His family later brushed it off as nothing more than dehydration.

The fact he was quickly back resting at home didn’t surprise those who really know him.

``Ali was always at his best when things were the worst,’’ said Gene Kilroy, his former business manager and good friend. ``It’s the kind of man he is.’’

Ali, his daughter says, is in the late stages of Parkinson’s now, a time when doctors say patients are particularly susceptible to things that can kill them.

An older Ali with fans

Pneumonia is the leading cause of death among Parkinson’s patients, who are also at constant risk for other infections. The increasing inability to swallow can be fatal, and falls are always a major concern.

``He’s had a very visible and courageous fight against this disease. He has not given up,’’ said Dr. Blair Ford, a professor of clinical neurology at Columbia University, who specializes in Parkinson’s research. ``Three decades of Parkinson’s is devastating. This is a tougher opponent than anyone he’s faced.’’

How Ali got the disease will never be known, because not much is known about the cause of Parkinson’s, other than it is characterized by increasingly severe tremors and periodically stiff or frozen limbs. What is known is that patients gradually lose brain cells that produce dopamine, a chemical key to the circuitry that controls muscle movement, and the treatment is generally dopamine-boosting medication.

Ali once calculated that he took 29,000 punches to the head in a career that spanned more than two decades. He fought without headgear as an amateur, and never backed down while trading punches with brutal sluggers like Frazier, Earnie Shavers and Foreman.

By the final stages of his career, he was slurring his words. Not long afterward, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s.

Lieberman says he doesn’t believe Ali got Parkinson’s because of repeated blows to the head because he doesn’t have classic Dementia Pugilista, which afflicted the late Jerry Quarry, whom Ali defeated twice. Ali is coherent and his thought process is still intact, though the Parkinson’s forces him to communicate more with gestures and actions instead of words.

Daughter Maryum believes her father’s choice of profession had something to do with his fate.

``In my heart, I think it was a combination of Parkinson’s and trauma to the head,’’ she said. ``He got hit a lot and he fought for a long time.’’

Indeed he did. Ali’s fights often went 15 rounds and he would often stick his head out and dare opponents to land punches just to respond with some flurries and, on a good night, perhaps even do the Ali shuffle.

The stories of his legendary battles with Frazier and Foreman are etched in the fabric of the times, monuments to a sport that has never been the same since he retired. His fights were so big they had names like the ``Thrilla in Manilla’’ and the ``Rumble in the Jungle.’’

Back then, no one could have imagined the Ali they see now. He was a towering figure who won over a country with his mere presence when he fought Foreman in Zaire. Bombastic on the stage, he taunted opponents and teased world figures, once telling Philippines president Ferdinand Marcos: ``I saw your wife. You’re not as dumb as you look.’’

``He was brash. He could shoot off his mouth. He could do things a lot of people want to do but couldn’t do, and he backed it up with his fists,’’ said Ed Schuyler Jr., who traveled the world covering Ali’s fights for The Associated Press. ``He was Muhammad Ali. There will never be another like him.’’

Other stories came later. Foreman tells how he tenderly helped Ali button his shirt as they prepared for a dinner honoring them in London. It was early in the progression of his disease, and Ali didn’t appreciate his old foe having to help him get ready, challenging Foreman to another fight.

Later the world would be shocked at the sight of Ali trembling almost uncontrollably as he stood for what seemed like forever while lighting the Olympic flame in 1996 in Atlanta. It’s a moment indelibly etched in time, and it helped turn the final sentiment of public opinion, some resented his refusal to be drafted, in his favor.

More recently, Ramsey tells the story of going with Ali to visit a dying boy in the hospital, something Ali has done with regularity since his championship days.

Then, as before, the rule was no cameras, no press. Just Ali and the boy in the room together.

``He just held the boy’s hand for a long time and they stared in each other’s eyes,’’ Ramsey said. ``He didn’t say a word, they just connected.’’

Today, Ali still goes to occasional sporting events, where he is invariably greeted with warm, standing ovations. His oldest daughter joined him last September for one, sitting with Ali and his wife in the owner’s suite at Angel Stadium for a baseball game. Ali was taken to the suite in a golf cart, waving and shaking hands as he slowly went by.

``His eyes were bright and he was really enjoying himself,’’ Maryum Ali said. ``Lonnie says he functions better when he uses his mind, and I know it makes him feel good when people remember him.’’

The festivities for his 70th birthday include a Feb. 18 bash at the MGM Grand arena in Las Vegas, where celebrities and former fighters like Foreman, Ken Norton, Leon Spinks and Roberto Duran will pay tribute to him. Manny Pacquiao may sing a song, and millions of dollars will be raised for brain research.

People will come because he’s Muhammad Ali. But they’ll also be there because of the person he is, the kind of person who never turned down an autograph. The kind of person who tried to help the less fortunate or the sick. The kind of person who never gets down because he wants to keep those around him up.

``I would ask him how he stays so positive,’’ Ramsey said. ``He would say, `I’ve got the best known face on the planet. I’m the three-time heavyweight champion of the world. I’ve got no reason to be down.’’’

``He just has a good heart. He doesn’t believe in being mean to people,’’ his daughter said. ``If someone was in need, he would always help them without even thinking about it.’’

Maryum Ali said her father knows he didn’t lead a perfect life. But he takes comfort in his religion, and he accepts everything he’s been given.

That goes for the Parkinson’s, too.

``He would always say I’d rather suffer now than in the hereafter,’’ she said. ``That’s just who my dad is.’’

Is Poe’s Toaster Toast?

Baltimore (AP) — Is the “Poe Toaster” nevermore?

For decades, a mysterious man left a three roses and cognac on Edgar Allan Poe’s grave to mark the anniversary of the writer’s birth. But after the visitor, dubbed the “Poe Toaster,” failed to appear two years in a row, Poe fans are planning one last vigil this week before calling an end to the annual Jan. 19 tradition.

The gothic master’s tales of the macabre still connect with readers more than 200 years after his birth, including his most famous poem, “The Raven” and short stories including “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Pit and the Pendulum.” Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” is considered the first modern detective story.

Poe House and Museum Curator Jeff Jerome, who has kept watch for the “Poe Toaster” since 1978, believes that it’s Poe’s suffering and his lifelong dream to be a poet that people still relate to. While the midnight tribute has a touch of the theatrical, it’s also an honest expression, Jerome said. Wherever Jerome travels in the world, he said when people find out what he does, they want to know whether the “Poe Toaster” is real.

Edgar Allan Poe

“It’s such an innocent, such a touching tribute,” Jerome said. “People are so captivated by the warmth of the message.”

Poe lived for a time in Baltimore, but died in 1849 at age 40 after collapsing in a tavern during a visit to the city years later. He was buried in Westminster Burial Ground, then moved to a more prominent spot in the front of the cemetery in 1875. The rose and cognac tributes of an anonymous man dressed in black with a white scarf and wide-brimmed hat are thought to date back to at least the 1940s.

The vigil inside the former church is closed to the public, but over the years, a crowd has gathered outside the gates to watch. After the “Poe Toaster” failed to show in 2010, last year’s vigil attracted imposters, including a man who arrived in a limo as well as a few women.

The visitor has left notes on occasion. A few indicated that the tradition passed to a new generation after the death of the original “Poe Toaster” in the late 1990s, and some even mentioned politics and sports. Those notes make it even more frustrating for Jerome that there has been no message explaining the absence.