[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 12 (Thursday, January 18, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 3419-3420]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2024-00832]


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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

National Park Service

[NPS-WASO-NAGPRA-NPS0037264; PPWOCRADN0-PCU00RP14.R50000]


Notice of Intent To Repatriate Cultural Items: Pioneer Museum, 
Blue Licks Battlefield State Resort, Kentucky Department of Parks, 
Carlisle, KY

AGENCY: National Park Service, Interior.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: In accordance with the Native American Graves Protection and 
Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), the Pioneer Museum, Blue Licks Battlefield 
State Resort Park, Kentucky Department of Parks intends to repatriate 
certain cultural items that meet the definition of unassociated 
funerary objects and that have a cultural affiliation with the Indian 
Tribes or Native Hawaiian organizations in this notice. The cultural 
items were removed from Mason, KY.

DATES: Repatriation of the cultural items in this notice may occur on 
or after February 20, 2024.

ADDRESSES: Jennifer Spence, Parks Museum Curator, Kentucky Department 
of Parks, 500 Mero Street, 5th Floor, Frankfort, KY 40601, telephone 
(502) 892-3339, email [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This notice is published as part of the 
National Park Service's administrative responsibilities under NAGPRA. 
The determinations in this notice are the sole responsibility of the 
Kentucky

[[Page 3420]]

Department of Parks. The National Park Service is not responsible for 
the determinations in this notice. Additional information on the 
determinations in this notice, including the results of consultation, 
can be found in the summary or related records held by the Kentucky 
Department of Parks.

Description

    The 274 cultural items were removed from Mason County, KY. These 
cultural items were collected in the 1920s thru the 1940s. The Pioneer 
Museum's founder, William Curtis, was a collector of these objects and 
took part in excavations at Fox Field (Fox Farm Fort Ancient culture 
archeological site), Mason County, Kentucky, and possibly at other 
sites in Kentucky. Curtis worked with other collectors in the field to 
acquire objects for the museum from surrounding counties in the state, 
but most items with a known provenience trace back to Fox Field. Most 
of these items are displayed and stored in the museum.
    The 274 unassociated funerary objects are two adzes, six awls, 
eight game balls, five deer knuckle beads, two copper bracelets, two 
celts, one chisel, 12 discoidals, four drills, eight effigies, one 
effigy bead, five pottery figurines, one fishhook, 11 shell gorgets, 
one limestone gorget, one slate gorget, one grooved bone hairpin, one 
knapping hammer, three hoes, one grooved bone body ornament, nine flint 
knives, three necklaces of shell and bone beads, one necklace of animal 
bones, two bone sewing needles, 15 stone pendants, two shell pendants, 
four conch shell wheel pendants, four cannel coal pendants, three bear 
tooth pendants, two animal bone pendants, two ceramic disk pendants, 
two stone pestles, 10 pipes, 27 projectile points, one hide scraper, 61 
pottery sherds, two bone whistles, one whetstone, one atlatl weight, 19 
pottery vessels, four uniface knives, two mussel shell spoons, one 
strand of nine bone, clay, and shell beads, one strand of bear and 
canine teeth and a hawks claw, seven bear teeth fragments, one strand 
of 10 canine teeth, one strand of 13 marine shells, one strand of 12 
beads, one string of seven beads, one string of 12 shell beads, one 
string of 18 shell beads, one strand of nine shell beads, one strand of 
seven conical shaped shell beads, one strand of 12 animal teeth, one 
strand of small shell beads, one strand of nine stone beads, and one 
animal tooth bead.

Cultural Affiliation

    The cultural items in this notice are connected to one or more 
identifiable earlier groups, tribes, peoples, or cultures. There is a 
relationship of shared group identity between the identifiable earlier 
groups, tribes, peoples, or cultures and one or more Indian Tribes or 
Native Hawaiian organizations. The following types of information were 
used to reasonably trace the relationship: archeological information, 
geographical information, historical information, other relevant 
information, or expert opinion.

Determinations

    Pursuant to NAGPRA and its implementing regulations, and after 
consultation with the appropriate Indian Tribes and Native Hawaiian 
organizations, the Kentucky Department of Parks has determined that:
     The 274 cultural items described above are 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.
     There is a relationship of shared group identity that can 
be reasonably traced between the cultural items and the Absentee-
Shawnee Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma; Eastern Shawnee Tribe of 
Oklahoma; and the Shawnee Tribe.

Requests for Repatriation

    Additional, written requests for repatriation of the cultural items 
in this notice must be sent to the Responsible Official identified in 
ADDRESSES. Requests for repatriation may be submitted by any lineal 
descendant, Indian Tribe, or Native Hawaiian organization not 
identified in this notice who shows, by a preponderance of the 
evidence, that the requestor is a lineal descendant or a culturally 
affiliated Indian Tribe or Native Hawaiian organization.
    Repatriation of the cultural items in this notice to a requestor 
may occur on or after February 20, 2024. If competing requests for 
repatriation are received, the Kentucky Department of Parks must 
determine the most appropriate requestor prior to repatriation. 
Requests for joint repatriation of the cultural items are considered a 
single request and not competing requests. The Kentucky Department of 
Parks is responsible for sending a copy of this notice to the Indian 
Tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations identified in this notice.
    Authority: Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, 
25 U.S.C. 3003, and the implementing regulations, 43 CFR 10.8, 10.10, 
and 10.14.

    Dated: January 11, 2024.
Melanie O'Brien,
Manager, National NAGPRA Program.
[FR Doc. 2024-00832 Filed 1-17-24; 8:45 am]
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