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The Repatriation Database Data from Nov. 29, 2023

Standing Rock Sioux Tribe of North and South Dakota

A federally recognized Indian tribe with headquarters in South Dakota, North Dakota

Institutions reported making the remains of more than 2,500 Native Americans available for return to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

The tribe was also eligible to claim more than 14,400 associated funerary objects.

Institutions continue to hold the remains of at least 1,400 Native Americans taken from counties known to be of interest to the tribe.*

Where Native American remains made available for return to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe were taken from

Each county is a peak
Height is amount of remains taken from county and made available by institutions for return to tribe
No remains taken from these counties made available for return to tribe
Institution that made remains available for return
Swipe interaction icon
Note: Remains of 142 Native Americans with no location information were made available for return to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.
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.

These 36 institutions made Native American remains available for return to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

InstitutionRemains Made Available for Return To Tribe
University of Nebraska State Museum820
History Nebraska586
U.S. Department of Justice412
Beloit College, Logan Museum of Anthropology104
Wisconsin Historical Society87
U.S. Department of the Interior78
University of Iowa, Office of the State Archaeologist76
University of Wyoming54
University of Colorado Museum48
U.S. Department of Defense45
University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Department of Anthropology39
University of Denver, Museum of Anthropology36
Denver Museum of Nature and Science24
Fort Collins Museum of Discovery17
Carter County Museum14
University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh13
Chadron State College8
Coe College7
Harvard University4
South Dakota State Historical Society, State Archaeological Research Center4
Colorado Bureau of Investigation3
Columbia University, Department of Anthropology3
American Museum of Natural History2
California Department of Parks and Recreation2
Mutter Museum, College of Physicians of Philadelphia2
Oregon State University2
University of Wisconsin, Madison, Department of Anthropology2
Field Museum1
History Colorado1
Illinois State Museum1
Missouri Historical Society1
Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology, Phillips Academy1
State Historical Society of Iowa1
State Historical Society of North Dakota1
University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology1
Utah Department of Natural Resources1

Timeline of Native American remains made available for return to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe

Tribal and institutional capacity, funding, staffing, regulatory changes, audits, Review Committee decisions and litigation may influence timelines. Under NAGPRA, institutions determine whether Native American remains may be returned through cultural affiliation using evidence such as tribal traditional knowledge and biological and archaeological links, or through disposition based on geographic affiliation.

These institutions have not made available for return the remains of at least 1,400 Native Americans that were taken from counties known to be of interest to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

These are estimates calculated using remains not made available for return from counties that the tribe has previously been eligible to claim remains from, as well as counties that the tribe has indicated interest in to the federal government. They are not comprehensive figures. The tribe may not wish to claim the remains, and other tribes may also seek to claim them.
InstitutionRemains Not Made Available for Return That Were Taken From Counties of Interest to the Tribe
Milwaukee Public Museum491
Harvard Univ.204
Univ. of Wisconsin, Oshkosh130
Wisconsin Historical Society71
Museum Division (44)
Historic Preservation Division (27)
Oshkosh Public Museum55
Illinois State Museum53
Univ. of Wisconsin, La Crosse49
Trinidad State Junior College46
Center for American Archeology, Kampsville Archeological Center45
American Museum of Natural History27
Dept. of the Interior27
Wyoming State Office (13)
Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife Refuge (4)
BIA (3)
Reclamation, Great Plains Region, Wyoming Area Office (3)
Trempealeau National Wildlife Refuge (3)
Reclamation, Great Plains Region, Nebraska-Kansas Area Office (1)
Neville Public Museum26
Dept. of Defense26
Omaha District (23)
St. Paul District (2)
National Museum of Health and Medicine (1)
Univ. of Wyoming23
Lawrence Univ.22
Univ. of Michigan14
Grand Rapids Public Museum13
History Nebraska12
Hastings Museum11
Ball State Univ.6
South Dakota State Historical Society, State Archaeological Research Center6
Univ. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign6
Kenosha Public Museum5
Univ. of Tennessee, Knoxville4
Dept. of Anthropology (3)
Frank H. McClung Museum (1)
Buffalo Bill Center of the West3
Univ. of Nebraska State Museum3
Brigham Young Univ.2
Rochester Museum and Science Center2
Southern Illinois Univ., Carbondale2
Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer2
Univ. of Iowa2
Cass County Historical Society Museum1
Cleveland Museum of Natural History1
Denver Museum of Nature and Science1
Field Museum1
Florida State Univ.1
Indiana Univ.1
Montana Historical Society1
Montana State Univ., Museum of the Rockies1
Natural History Museum of Utah1
New York Univ.1
Putnam Museum1
Springfield Science Museum1
Tioga Point Museum1
Univ. of California, Berkeley1
Univ. of Kentucky1
Univ. of Missouri, Columbia1
Univ. of Pennsylvania1
Univ. of Wisconsin, Milwaukee1
Counties of interest used in estimate include: Adams, Arapahoe, Baca, Boulder, Crowley, Douglas, Elbert, Fremont, Huerfano, Jefferson, Kiowa, Larimer, Las Animas, Lincoln, Logan, Morgan, Prowers, Pueblo, Saguache, Sedgwick, Weld and Yuma in Colorado. Allamakee, Clayton and Woodbury in Iowa. Hancock, Jo Daviess and Rock Island in Illinois. Delaware in Indiana. Big Horn, Carter, Fallon, Powder River and Roosevelt in Montana. Adams, Antelope, Arthur, Banner, Boone, Box Butte, Boyd, Brown, Buffalo, Burt, Cass, Cedar, Chase, Cherry, Cuming, Custer, Dakota, Dawes, Dawson, Dixon, Dodge, Douglas, Dundy, Fillmore, Franklin, Frontier, Furnas, Gage, Garden, Garfield, Grant, Hall, Harlan, Hitchcock, Holt, Hooker, Howard, Keith, Keya Paha, Knox, Lancaster, Lincoln, Logan, Madison, Mcpherson, Morrill, Nance, Nemaha, Platte, Red Willow, Richardson, Sarpy, Saunders, Scotts Bluff, Sheridan, Sherman, Sioux, Stanton, Thayer, Thomas, Valley, Washington and Webster in Nebraska. Brown, Buffalo, Crawford, Door, Dunn, Forest, Grant, Green Lake, Jackson, Jefferson, Kenosha, La Crosse, Marathon, Milwaukee, Oneida, Pierce, Rock, Trempealeau, Vernon, Waukesha and Winnebago in Wisconsin. Big Horn, Campbell, Carbon, Converse, Crook, Fremont, Goshen, Hot Springs, Johnson, Natrona, Niobrara, Park, Platte, Sheridan, Washakie and Weston in Wyoming
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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