Skip to content
ProPublica
Donate
ProPublica
Donate
The Repatriation Database Data from Nov. 29, 2023

Idaho

Institutions reported making 18% of the more than 100 Native American remains taken from Idaho available for return to tribes under NAGPRA.

remains of 32 Native Americans made available for return to tribes
remains of at least 146 Native Americans not made available for return

There are seven institutions located in Idaho that reported Native American remains taken from across the country.

InstitutionRemains Not Made Available for ReturnRemains Made Available for Return% of Remains Made Available for Return
Idaho State Historical Society13611%
Idaho State University, Idaho Museum of Natural History2200%
University of Idaho, Alfred W. Bowers Laboratory of Anthropology83682%
College of Southern Idaho5117%
Idaho Department of Transportation04100%
U.S. Department of Agriculture01100%
U.S. Department of the Interior021100%

There are 15 institutions that reported Native American remains taken from Idaho.

InstitutionRemains Not Made Available for ReturnRemains Made Available for Return% of Remains Made Available for Return
Idaho State Historical Society12711%
Idaho State University, Idaho Museum of Natural History1300%
University of California, Berkeley200%
Indiana University100%
Natural History Museum of Utah100%
St. Joseph Museums, Inc.100%
University of Idaho, Alfred W. Bowers Laboratory of Anthropology100%
Field Museum02100%
Idaho Department of Transportation04100%
Karshner Museum01100%
U.S. Department of Agriculture07100%
U.S. Department of Defense07100%
U.S. Department of the Interior08100%
University of Connecticut, Connecticut State Museum of Natural History01100%
University of Washington01100%
Under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, when an institution establishes a connection between tribes and remains, it must publish a list of the tribes eligible to make a repatriation claim. The remains are then made available for return to the tribe(s). Once a tribal claim is made, physical transfer may occur. Many remains have been physically returned to tribes, but data on this is spotty because the law does not require institutions to report when these transfers occur.

Institutions made Native American remains taken from Idaho available for return to nine tribes.

Institutions often make remains available for return to multiple tribes, so the amount of remains listed below may be counted for more than one tribe.
TribeRemains Made Available for Return to Tribe
Nez Perce Tribe21
Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of the Fort Hall Reservation7
Shoshone-Paiute Tribes of the Duck Valley Reservation, Nevada7
Northwestern Band of Shoshoni Nation6
Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation4
Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation4
Kootenai Tribe of Idaho2
Kalispel Indian Community of the Kalispel Reservation1
Lineal Descendant1

Institutions reported Native American remains taken from 19 counties in Idaho.

CountyRemains Taken From County Not Made Available for ReturnRemains Made Available for Return% of Remains Made Available for Return
Adams County6000%
Washington County1900%
Idaho County5655%
Owyhee County4120%
Payette County300%
Twin Falls County300%
Elmore County2360%
Jerome County2133%
Lemhi County2250%
Bannock County100%
Bear Lake County100%
Bingham County100%
Bonner County1150%
Butte County1150%
Canyon County100%
Madison County100%
Boundary County02100%
Clearwater County03100%
Nez Perce County010100%
Get in touch

Know how an institution is handling repatriation? Have a personal story to share? We'd like to hear from you.

Learn how to report on repatriation

Watch an informational webinar with our reporters.

Sign up for the newsletter
About the Data

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