Los Angeles County, California
Institutions reported making 86% of the more than 2,900 Native American remains taken from Los Angeles County, California available for return to tribes under NAGPRA.
There are 33 institutions that reported Native American remains taken from Los Angeles County, California.
| Institution | Remains Not Made Available for Return | Remains Made Available for Return | % of Remains Made Available for Return |
|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles County | 103 | 0 | 0% |
| University of California, Berkeley | 90 | 0 | 0% |
| Los Angeles County Natural History Museum | 72 | 45 | 38% |
| Autry Museum of the American West | 55 | 5 | 8% |
| U.S. Department of Defense | 37 | 5 | 12% |
| California State University, Northridge, Center for Public Archaeology | 27 | 0 | 0% |
| California Department of Parks and Recreation | 5 | 264 | 98% |
| Dartmouth College, Hood Museum of Art | 5 | 0 | 0% |
| California State University, Dominguez Hills | 3 | 0 | 0% |
| Bowers Museum | 2 | 0 | 0% |
| California State University, Fullerton | 2 | 0 | 0% |
| Carnegie Museum of Natural History | 2 | 0 | 0% |
| Harvard University | 1 | 76 | 99% |
| University of California, Santa Barbara, Department of Anthropology | 1 | 1 | 50% |
| Discovery Place | 1 | 0 | 0% |
| Earlham College | 1 | 0 | 0% |
| Minnesota Indian Affairs Council | 1 | 0 | 0% |
| Peabody Essex Museum | 1 | 0 | 0% |
| University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology | 1 | 0 | 0% |
| University of New Mexico, Maxwell Museum of Anthropology | 1 | 0 | 0% |
| American Museum of Natural History | 0 | 3 | 100% |
| California Department of Transportation | 0 | 13 | 100% |
| California State University, Long Beach | 0 | 20 | 100% |
| California State University, Los Angeles | 0 | 2 | 100% |
| Catalina Island Museum Society, Inc. | 0 | 367 | 100% |
| Field Museum | 0 | 3 | 100% |
| Gilcrease Museum | 0 | 2 | 100% |
| Los Angeles Pierce College | 0 | 18 | 100% |
| New York University, College of Dentistry | 0 | 8 | 100% |
| San Bernardino County Museum | 0 | 1 | 100% |
| Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History | 0 | 3 | 100% |
| U.S. Department of Agriculture | 0 | 3 | 100% |
| University of California, Los Angeles, Fowler Museum of Cultural History | 0 | 1,719 | 100% |
Institutions made Native American remains taken from Los Angeles County, California available for return to 25 tribes.
| Tribe | Remains Made Available for Return to Tribe |
|---|---|
| Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Mission Indians of the Santa Ynez Reservation, California | 2,411 |
| Yuhaaviatam of San Manuel Nation | 123 |
| Pechanga Band of Indians | 111 |
| Soboba Band of Luiseno Indians, California | 91 |
| La Jolla Band of Luiseno Indians, California | 89 |
| Pala Band of Mission Indians | 89 |
| Pauma Band of Luiseno Mission Indians of the Pauma and Yuima Reservation, California | 89 |
| Rincon Band of Luiseno Indians | 89 |
| Morongo Band of Mission Indians, California | 39 |
| Fernandeno Tataviam Band of Mission Indians | 26 |
| Santa Rosa Band of Cahuilla Indians, California | 11 |
| Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians of the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation, California | 9 |
| Augustine Band of Cahuilla Indians, California | 9 |
| Cabazon Band of Cahuilla Indians | 9 |
| Cahuilla Band of Indians | 9 |
| Los Coyotes Band of Cahuilla and Cupeno Indians, California | 9 |
| Ramona Band of Cahuilla, California | 9 |
| Torres Martinez Desert Cahuilla Indians, California | 9 |
| San Fernando Band of Mission Indians | 8 |
| Chemehuevi Indian Tribe of the Chemehuevi Reservation, California | 5 |
| Colorado River Indian Tribes of the Colorado River Indian Reservation, Arizona and California | 5 |
| Santa Rosa Indian Community of the Santa Rosa Rancheria, California | 3 |
| Table Mountain Rancheria | 3 |
| Tule River Indian Tribe of the Tule River Reservation, California | 3 |
| Tuolumne Band of Me-Wuk Indians of the Tuolumne Rancheria of California | 3 |
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This tool presents a dataset maintained by the National Park Service containing all the Native American human remains and associated funerary objects that institutions have reported to the federal government under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. The dataset includes information about the state and county where remains and objects were taken from, which institutions hold them and whether they have been made available for return to tribes.
The data is self-reported by institutions. The amount of unrepatriated Native American remains reported by institutions is a minimum estimate of individuals and institutions frequently adjust these numbers when they reinventory groups of remains. Some institutions that are subject to NAGPRA have also entirely failed to report the remains in their possession. As a result, the numbers provided are best taken as estimates. The actual number and geographic scope of what’s held by publicly funded institutions is larger than what is presently documented.
ProPublica supplemented this dataset with information about cultural affiliation and disposition to specific tribes by systematically parsing the text of Notices of Inventory Completion published in the Federal Register. An additional dataset from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Tribal Directory Assessment Tool, was used for the section on remains not made available for return from counties that each tribe has indicated interest in to the federal government.
Institution location and tribal headquarters location information was provided by National NAGPRA. The location of some groups that are not federally recognized was provided through research by ProPublica.
Institutions that are part of a larger entity are grouped. (For example, the Mesa Verde National Park is part of the U.S. Department of the Interior.)
Institutions that have not submitted information to the federal government are not listed. The Smithsonian Institution is not listed because its repatriation process falls under the National Museum of the American Indian Act and it is not required to publicly report its holdings with the same detail as institutions subject to NAGPRA.
If you work for an institution and would like to provide comment on your institution’s repatriation efforts, please email [email protected]. If you think the data is incorrect or have a data request, please get in touch. We are aware of some issues with the accuracy of location information and tribes mistakenly being identified for disposition of Native American remains in published notices.
If you want to share something else with ProPublica, we’d like to hear from you.
If you have questions about implementing or complying with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, get in touch with National NAGPRA or the NAGPRA Community of Practice.
We use the word “tribes” to refer to all groups that institutions made Native American remains available to under NAGPRA. This includes tribes, nations, bands, pueblos, communities, Native Alaskan villages, Native Hawaiian organizations and non-federally recognized groups.
Data sources from Department of the Interior, National Park Service, National NAGPRA Program, the Federal Register, Department of Housing and Development, Tribal Directory Assessment Tool