PORT ANGELES — Lower Elwha Klallam tribal members say their minds are more at ease after knowing where their ancestors were buried along the Port Angeles waterfront.
Lower Elwha Klallam tribal elder Gerald Charles Sr. said the tribe knew that Klallam villages had been located along the waterfront in past decades, and knew that ancestors had been buried somewhere, but the details had been lost over time.
The discovery was made in mid-August, shortly after contractors for the state Department of Transportation began excavation for a $17 million Hood Canal Bridge graving yard on Marine Drive just east of the Daishowa America paper mill.
Work on the graving yard, a huge onshore dry dock in which concrete anchors and pontoons for a new half of the Hood Canal floating bridge will be built, was halted Tuesday because of the discovery.
“My heart feels lighter because of the work we’ve done here,” Charles said.
“It is sort of a mission impossible, but we hope we can both come out winners in this.”
A private ceremony honoring the remains of the Native American ancestors and attended by about 50 people — including state Transportation Secretary Doug MacDonald — was held Saturday on a beach on the Lower Elwha Klallam Reservation west of Port Angeles.
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The rest of the story is in the Monday Peninsula Daily News.
