Tribe’s buildings on list of endangered historic sites

Kneeling in a remote stretch of Sonoma County forest, Reno Franklin used his fingers and an archeologist’s trowel to sift through the rich, brown soil where he believes an ancient Indian village once stood.

He was looking for clues to the laborious life his ancestors had once carved out of this land, and he dusted off a tiny obsidian arrowhead, gently and reverently holding the well-chiseled stone up to the sunlight.

The owner of the forestland wants to harvest its redwoods. Franklin said he worried such fragile artifacts would be trampled in the process.

“It’s so beautiful, it doesn’t even look real,” he said of the stretch of woods known as Bohan Dillon Ridge that slopes away to the ocean a few miles away. “How could you not want to protect this?”

Franklin is historic preservation officer for the Kashia band of Pomo Indians, whose history stretches back for thousands of years in this region 100 miles north of San Francisco. Today his fight to protect the tribe’s past from developers, looters and vandals received a critical moment in the spotlight.

The nonprofit National Trust for Historic Preservation released its annual list of America’s most endangered historic places, and two Kashia sites -- the Regalia House and the sacred Old Round House on the reservation at Stewarts Point Rancheria -- were on the list of 11 locations.

National Trust officials say the Kashia sites highlight a common problem: Tribal sites from Connecticut to California are being bulldozed and pillaged as frustrated tribes, most without casino revenue, lack the funds to protect their heritage.

When it comes to sacred Native American sites, cultural misperceptions abound, tribal officials say. For years, for instance, youth groups in the United States encouraged the collection of arrowheads.

Trust officials want Congress to increase the amount tribes receive under the 1966 National Historic Preservation Act. Without the means to boost preservation and public education, said National Trust President Richard Moe, “the Kashia and many other tribes will lose everything that’s sacred and important.”

Since 1996, the number of reservations seeking federal preservation funds has soared from 12 to 66, and tribes have scrambled to hire preservation officers like Franklin. But funding levels in the 41-year-old federal program have not kept up with demand, and the average amount a tribe receives will soon be cut in half, to $45,000, according to statistics provided by the trust.

“It’s a long-standing embarrassment for the federal government’s preservation program,” said Elizabeth Merritt, general counsel for the National Trust. “Here they are encouraging more tribes to participate in protecting their own culture. But each additional tribe gets a smaller slice of the funding pie.”

Not counting Alaska, 300 tribes inhabit more than 53 million acres nationwide.

Alan Downer, a preservation officer for the Navajo nation, said because of the low funding levels in Western states many enforcement officers who might catch looters must cover areas of 1,000 square miles or more, leaving most tribal sites unguarded.

“The money the federal government offers to help tribes is just enough to make you realize what you can’t do,” he said.

Tribal officials say many Americans are unaware that the ruins of ancient Indian cultures exist in their communities.

“Our people have been living here for thousands of years, not hundreds. People in America find it difficult to grasp that amount of time,” said Bambi Kraus, president of the National Assn. of Tribal Historic Preservation Officers. “Indian Country is full of sites with secrets and stories. All we ask is for respect.”

Tribes battle a black market of pilfered Native American sacred objects, which are routinely sold on Internet auction sites.

“There are tribal burial grounds being looted as we speak, all across the Western United States,” said Martin McAllister, an archeologist who specializes in recovering Native American artifacts. “It’s a huge industry.”

John Fryar, a retired investigator for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and a member of the Acoma Pueblo tribe in New Mexico, said he has seen numerous Native American skulls for sale, some for $10,000.

“I have a video of looters talking about how they scattered bones so their crime wouldn’t be so obvious,” he said. “One guy bragged about taking a toy out of the skeletal hand of a child.”

The Yurok tribe in Northern California has prosecuted numerous looters. One was a local jewelry maker caught digging on tribal burial grounds in Humboldt County. Another admitted to excavating 60 Native American sites, and told tribal officials it was research for a book.

Still, even with direct threats, it’s hard to earmark money for security on reservations where most residents live below the poverty line, said Tom Gates, the Yurok historic preservation officer. “We have 85% unemployment, one of the highest meth use rates and an astronomical high school dropout rate,” he said. “People are overwhelmed.”

Franklin is convinced many looters are scholars with advanced degrees who steal artifacts in the name of science. “It’s like me going into some religious chapel and chipping shards of stained glass window, or prying off some mosaic. It’s robbery.”

Franklin, 33, became active in tribal preservation in 2004 when a local winery bulldozed an ancient Kashia round house to create a vineyard.

“It made you feel like sitting down and crying,” said Walter Antone, a tribal elder who has mentored Franklin. “They stripped the land is what they did.”

The Kashia convinced winery owners to return hundreds of artifacts, which were later given a ritual burial. “Here were a few Indian boys facing lawyers the winery brought in from New York City,” Franklin said.

Wearing his long hair in a thin braid, Franklin patrols a 220-square mile area and often gets calls from state officials to scout for artifacts on land where owners want to build or log.

Along Bohan Dillon Ridge, he and two tribal colleagues walked silently through woods that could soon be overtaken by rumbling bulldozers. Along the way, they spotted arrowheads, smooth milling stones and bits of pottery. They asked a state archeologist and four others to replace artifacts exactly where they found them.

“We believe the spirits still exist here. It’s theirs,” said Antone, gently replacing an arrowhead in the dirt. “To take it would be stealing. It’s taboo.”

Franklin’s expertise comes from his archeology studies and the knowledge handed down by tribal elders. “The only way to protect these sites to our standards is to be here and see things with our own eyes,” he said.

“But we don’t assume that everything we encounter is a tribal artifact. You find so much cool mysterious stuff in these woods. But sometimes a rock is just a rock.”

What the Kashia are sure about is the significance of the round house noted by the National Trust officials. The structure was the site of religious ceremonies, where elders passed on the techniques of ancient tribal dances.

“The dances we learned here are our scripture,” said Violet Parish Chappell, a 77-year-old village elder. “This is the place we learned about who we are.”

The 80-year-old round house sits on a tribal reservation established in 1916, about 20 miles north of Bohan Dillon Ridge. The structure and adjacent regalia house, used to store religious costumes, were built to the specifications of a tribal visionary, who saw them in a dream.

According to custom, once a tribal visionary dies, the round house is abandoned and allowed to decay, a process the Kashia call “managed deterioration.”

After his excursion with state officials, Franklin returned to the reservation, driving on back roads his ancestors once trod by foot. In the late afternoon, he motioned to the dilapidated Old Round House, which has not been used since 1979.

The roof has collapsed, the walls are rickety and the old padlock on the door is rusted. Assuming the site was merely neglected, he said, tourists have broken off pieces of the structure. Some area teenagers recently tried to burn it down.

“We want to spread the word: This is the way we do things,” he said. “We let this sacred structure settle back to earth. That doesn’t mean people can poach it for trophies or firewood.”

Added Chappell: “This is our culture. We’re not savages.”

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john.glionna@latimes.com

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Endangered historic places

The National Trust for Historic Preservation named these sites on its 2007 list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places and gave the following explanations for their selection.

Brooklyn’s Industrial Waterfront, N.Y. -- The once-booming 19th century industrial waterfront is at risk of being demolished by developers.

El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro National Historic Trail, N.M. -- The earliest Euro-American trade route in the U.S. is threatened by a commercial venture.

H.H. Richardson House, Brookline, Mass. -- The last home and studio of famed 19th century American architect Henry Hobson Richardson -- creator of Boston’s landmark Trinity Church -- is vulnerable to demolition.

Hialeah Park Race Course, Hialeah, Fla. -- The 1925 racetrack known for its Mediterranean architecture and pink flamingos is threatened by a planned condo complex.

Historic Places in Transmission Line Corridors -- Officials in seven Eastern states are battling plans for high-voltage transmission lines that would blight historic landscapes.

Historic Structures in Mark Twain National Forest, Mo. -- Established by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, the 1.5-million-acre forest site’s fire lookouts and ranger stations are deteriorating.

Historic Route 66 Motels, Illinois to California -- In recent years, Route 66 motels in hot real estate markets have been torn down at record rates.

Minidoka Internment National Monument, Jerome County, Idaho -- The site, once home to 600 buildings, is looted for artifacts and is threatened by land-use planning.

Philip Simmons’ Workshop and Home, Charleston, S.C. -- The master blacksmith spent decades adorning his hometown with intricate ornamental ironwork -- but with no plans to preserve his home and studio, his legacy is in jeopardy.

Pinon Canyon, Colo. -- The area, which includes scenic buttes and river valleys, is threatened by the Army’s plans to expand its Pinon Canyon Maneuver Site.

Stewarts Point Rancheria, Calif. -- Two structures used as spiritual and cultural centers on the Kashia reservation near Santa Rosa, Calif., are endangered by lack of adequate federal funding to protect tribal historic resources.

Source: National Trust for Historic Preservation