Tribe's past and bridge's future clash on West Coast

It's not the first time a multimillion-dollar public works project has clashed with a major archaeological discovery. But it is believed that never before in the United States has a publicly funded project unearthed a burial ground of anything close to the size of the one discovered in Washington State.

That's why Washington Gov. Gary Locke announced late last month that the state is ending all construction work at an Indian village site where hundreds of ancient burials have been discovered. To date, workers have recovered nearly 300 bodies, 800 partial remains, and more than 5,000 artifacts, ranging in age from 400 to more than 1,700 years old. [Editor's note: The original version misstated the exact number of remains recovered.]

The announcement marks an end to more than a year of efforts by government and tribal officials to reconcile the conflicting values of archaeological discovery, preservation of the state's crumbling infrastructure, and respect for the dead.

The decision is a painful victory for the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe and a major setback for efforts to rehabilitate the aging Hood Canal Bridge. That floating saltwater span forms the only direct link between the Olympic Peninsula and greater Seattle.

The $275 million overhaul of the 1.5-mile bridge is the state's second-largest highway project. The state has already spent $58 million at the soon-to-be-abandoned construction site in Port Angeles. Months of continual discoveries at the site have turned it into one of the most important archaeological sites in the Western United States.

"What we found at the Port Angeles site is unparalleled in Washington prehistory," says senior archaeologist David Rice of the US Army Corps of Engineers' Seattle office.

Before construction began, archaeologists hired by the state dug several test pits and found nothing of significance. The tribe knew that a Klallam village had been located in the vicinity. But on the basis of an 1853 map from the US Coast Survey, they believed the village known as Tse-whit-zen lay just southeast of the construction zone.

The first human remains were discovered shortly after construction began. Work to build a dry dock for the construction of bridge pontoons and anchors soon came to a halt.

Frances Charles, the tribe's chairwoman, said that at that point she thought they were dealing with no more than a couple dozen ancestral remains, leaving her tribe in a quandary.

The bridge is a vital transportation link for the tribe as well as its neighbors on the Olympic Peninsula, and the construction project offered well-paying jobs.

Yet for the tribe, the idea of allowing their ancestors to remain buried underneath a huge cement slab was unacceptable. They feared that the slab would forever separate the spirits of the dead from their loved ones.

Page: 1 | 2