FR Doc E9-10577[Federal Register: May 7, 2009 (Volume 74, Number 87)]
[Notices]               
[Page 21383-21384]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr07my09-78]                         

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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

National Park Service

Notice of Intent to Repatriate a Cultural Item: U.S. Department 
of Agriculture, Forest Service, Tongass National Forest, Petersburg, AK

AGENCY: National Park Service, Interior.

ACTION: Notice.
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    Notice is here given in accordance with the Native American Graves 
Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), 25 U.S.C. 3005, of the intent 
to repatriate a cultural item in the control of the U.S. Department of 
Agriculture, Forest Service, Tongass National Forest, Petersburg, AK. 
The unassociated funerary object was removed from Kuiu Island in 
Southeast Alaska.
    This notice is published as part of the National Park Service's 
administrative responsibilities under NAGPRA, 25 U.S.C. 3003(d)(3). The 
determinations in

[[Page 21384]]

this notice are the sole responsibility of the museum, institution, or 
Federal agency that has control of the cultural item. The National Park 
Service is not responsible for the determinations in this notice.
    A detailed assessment of the unassociated funerary object was made 
by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service professional 
staff in consultation with representatives of the Klawock Cooperative 
Association and Organized Village of Kake.
    In 1976, an object was removed from a cave in Port Malmesbury, Kuiu 
Island in Southeast Alaska, by a Forest Service archeologist. The 
object is a wooden artifact that is believed to be a funerary object 
since the cave where it was removed from contained human remains and 
associated funerary objects. The human remains and associated funerary 
objects that were removed from Port Malmesbury, Kuiu Island were 
repatriated to the Organized Village of Kake in 1998, and are described 
in a Notice of Inventory Completion previously published in the Federal 
Register (63 FR 18034-18035, April 13, 1998). Due to an administrative 
oversight this funerary object was not included.
    Historical and ethnographic records, along with Tlingit oral 
history, indicate that a smallpox epidemic in the 1800s decimated the 
Tlingit communities on Kuiu Island and the survivors moved to Kake and 
Klawock. The members of the Killerwhale clan in these villages are the 
descendants of these survivors.
    Officials of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Tongass National 
Forest have determined that, pursuant to 25 U.S.C. 3001(3)(B), the one 
object described above is 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 a 
Native American individual. Officials of the U.S. Department of 
Agriculture, Tongass National Forest also have determined that, 
pursuant to 25 U.S.C. 3001(2), there is a relationship of shared group 
identity that can be reasonably traced between the unassociated 
funerary object and the Klawock Cooperative Association and Organized 
Village of Kake.
    Representatives of any other Indian tribe that believes itself to 
be culturally affiliated with the unassociated funerary object should 
contact Forrest Cole, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, 
Tongass National Forest, Federal Building, Ketchikan, AK 99901-6591, 
telephone (907) 225-3101, before June 8, 2009. Repatriation of the 
unassociated funerary object to the Klawock Cooperative Association and 
Organized Village of Kake may proceed after that date if no additional 
claimants come forward.
    The U.S. Department of Agriculture, Tongass National Forest is 
responsible for notifying the Central Council of Tlingit & Haida Indian 
Tribes, Klawock Cooperative Association, Organized Village of Kake, and 
Sealaska Corporation that this notice has been published.

    Dated: April 14, 2009.
Sherry Hutt,
Manager, National NAGPRA Program.
[FR Doc. E9-10577 Filed 5-6-09; 8:45 am]

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