On the evening of July 28, , archaeologist James Chatters received an unexpected call at his home in Richland, Wash. Two spectators at the local hydroplane races had found a skull in Columbia Park on the banks of the Columbia River near Kennewick, Wash.
The coroner wanted Chatters, a paleontologist and forensic anthropologist affiliated with Central Washington University who often consulted for Benton County, to look at the skull and determine if it belonged to a recent murder victim.
When the coroner arrived with the skull in a 5-gallon bucket, Chatters had scant notion that the discovery would end up challenging the reigning theory of the origins of the first Americans and would embroil scientists in a protracted, precedent-setting legal battle against the federal government. The skull, darkened with age, had a long, narrow braincase and a narrow face with little protrusion and a prominent nose. Chatters identified it as a Caucasoid skull type, having features similar to the skulls of those with ancestors in western Asia, Europe and northern Africa.
The skull lacked the distinctive features of Native American skulls, which exhibit a broad face with wide flat cheekbones and more facial protrusion, similar to the people of northeastern Asia, from areas such as Mongolia and Siberia. Although the skeleton was not identified as Native American, because the discovery was made on federal land administered by the U.
Under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act NAGPRA , human remains discovered on federal lands or being held in museums must be repatriated to the closest living indigenous tribe to whom a cultural affiliation or genetic link can be established. Following Native American religious customs, the bones are then usually reburied immediately, often in a secret location, with no further scientific study, which many tribes believe to be desecration.
