OLYMPIA — It wasn’t archaeological discoveries that stopped the Hood Canal Bridge graving yard in Port Angeles. It was religion.
That’s according to Allyson Brooks, head of the state Department of Archaeology & Historic Preservation and the state historic preservation officer.
In a letter to auditors who examined the graving yard project cancellation, she said the state Transportation Department’s yielding to the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe’s religious values — not archaeological concerns — ended the project.
Tribal members declined to discuss those beliefs with the PDN because of their lawsuit against the state and the secrecy of negotiations over the future of the graving yard site.
However, they previously have said privately that their ancestors are tangibly — even audibly — present in their lives.
Those ancestors are angry over having their remains excavated from their resting place at Tse-whit-zen, the ancient Klallam village that underlies the graving yard site beneath 6 feet of fill, the Lower Elwha.
Remains removed
The intact remains of 337 people were removed and placed in handmade cedar boxes before archaeological exploration stopped at the site and the graving yard was closed late in 2004.
In its lawsuit, the Lower Elwha demand to return those bones to Tse-whit-zen, to sift skeletal fragments from soil that was dug from the graving yard, and to return those partial remains, too, to the village site.
Tribal members daub red ochre below their eyes when they visit the site to ward off ancestors’ anger, and they ceremonially wash with water containing snowberries when they leave the site to avoid taking the ill will home.
Even so, Lower Elwha say they suffer physical and psychological distress at the site on Port Angeles Harbor near the crook of Ediz Hook.
Honored at canoe journey
Their belief that the ancestors are near was never clearer than at last summer’s Tribal Canoe Journey that the Lower Elwha hosted.
Canoe pullers — or paddlers — repeatedly and candidly spoke of feeling and hearing the ancestors both on the waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and at Tse-whit-zen.
One man, standing at the mouth of the Elwha River as Lower Elwha pullers sent their cedar canoe over the bar, said he could hear the ancestors laughing with joy.
According to Brooks’ letter — dated June 30 but not made available to the PDN until last week — “the underlying issue . . . is how we incorporate cultural values and religious beliefs into our decision-making processes in a manner that is fair, sensitive, constitutional and still results in a complete project.”
Sophisticated archaeological and geological exploration can find burial sites, she wrote, “but once we incorporate religious values and beliefs, then there are no longer any guarantees. . . .
“We need to do a better job of determining in advance how far we are willing to go and whether we are willing to go this far again and again and again.”
