GRAND FORKS, N.D. — A little over two years after University of North Dakota officials announced they’d identified the remains of dozens of Native Americans in the university’s possession, the return of the deceased to their descendants can begin.

“It’s finally done,” said Keith Malaterre, director of the Indigenous Student Center and a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians. “They finally get to go home.”

All told, the remains of some 57 ancestors and associated funerary objects are now available for repatriation, according to the two Federal Register notices published in August. Tribes have been able to submit written claims for ancestral remains since the notices went out.

Per the Federal Register notices, the remains have a “reasonable connection” to nearly two dozen Native tribes, including all five tribes in North Dakota as well as tribes in South Dakota, Minnesota, and Wyoming.

Many of the remains in question came from excavations of burial mounds across North Dakota. Ancestral remains were received by the university as early as 1907 and as late as 1982, according to the notices.

The university has also issued notices of intent to repatriate several sacred objects to area tribes, including the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians and the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate of the Lake Traverse Reservation in South Dakota.

An unspecified amount of ancestral remains or related objects possessed by UND was also transferred under the legal authority of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in August, in order to comply with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

An apology

The return of ancestral remains comes just over two years after UND first announced it had located what it estimated at the time as around 250 boxes of sacred objects and the remains of what was initially estimated to be 70 Native American ancestors.

Faculty had first identified ancestral remains in the university’s possession in March 2022, beginning months of discussions with area tribal nations.

President Andy Armacost issued an apology to tribal nations across the country and pledged to return the remains and any sacred objects in the university’s possession to their respective tribes.

Since 2022, the university has worked since then with the affected tribes as well as multiple state and federal agencies to inventory the ancestral remains and identify their rightful recipients while remaining in compliance with NAGPRA.

The search

Crystal Alberts, co-chair of UND’s NAGPRA compliance committee, says staff has searched “building to building, floor to floor, door to door” to identify any ancestral remains in the university’s possession.

Even so, she did not rule out the possibility of more ancestral remains being found in the future.

“I can’t definitively say no one else will be found and there is no one else,” Alberts said. “That would be an irresponsible statement.”

Dianne Desrosiers, the tribal historic preservation officer for the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate tribe, credited UND for its handling of the reparation process.

“I have to commend UND,” Desrosiers said. “They worked with the tribes and did everything they could within their power to make this process easy and smooth for tribes.”

‘Private and sacred’

As opposed to its very public early stages, administrators have elected to avoid publicizing this latest step in the repatriation process.

An email went out to members of the university’s Indigenous community in July informing them of the forthcoming Federal Register notices.

“This is a very private and sacred time for our tribal nations and we want to respect that,” Armacost told the Herald earlier this month, adding the affected tribes had been “very patient” over the two years working with the university.

Keali’i Baker, a third-year law student who is president of the Native American Law Students Association, says he believes the end of the repatriation process will mean relief for Native students and the opportunity to heal.

“I think students will just be happy it’s over,” said Baker, a member of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation. “We’ll always be sad it happened in the first place and it wasn’t taken care of sooner.”

Still, he noted, he felt the university, and Armacost in particular, had handled the task of repatriation as best they could.

Sacred objects

The process of repatriating sacred objects and other objects of cultural patrimony will likely take longer than the return of ancestral remains.

According to a summary submitted by UND to the National Park Service under NAGPRA, UND has sent summaries of the sacred objects in its possession to 49 tribes that may have a claim to those items.

Two tribes and one lineal descendant have reached out to claim sacred objects so far. The Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate tribe is claiming a pipe that belonged to a series of tribal chiefs named Standing Buffalo, per Desrosiers.

She said the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate tribe seeks to display the pipe alongside other sacred objects, with the goal of establishing a museum documenting the tribe’s history.

“We want to be able to educate people about us, about who we are, what our history here has been and how long it has been, because we have been here for thousands of years,” she said.

‘At peace’

Desrosiers declined to share specific details on how the tribe will address the return of ancestral remains.

“It is a very private thing,” she said. “We are repatriating human remains. It would be akin to going to retrieve your ancestors out of a museum or research facility.”

Malaterre, who also served on the repatriation committee, said he anticipated his tribe would hold a traditional burial for the ancestral remains the tribe receives from UND.

He said the tribe had responded similarly to the repatriation of the remains of ancestors who died at federally-run boarding schools.

A proper burial in the Ojibwe tradition is important, Malaterre said, because it helps to shepherd the spirit into the afterlife.

“I’m just happy they’re in the right place and at peace,” he said. “That they’re not in a state of unrest, that their spirit has moved on.”

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The Wild felt their first shakeup of a young training camp on Monday when Matt Boldy was unable to practice because of a lower body injury. Coach John Hynes said the injury isn’t serious, but the setback is real.

The team started work on their penalty kill during two practices Monday, and Boldy was expected to be a participant because the Wild want to work one of their top forwards onto the PK this season.

John Capuano, hired as a third assistant coach to John Hynes this summer, ran the first real PK practices on Monday, what the Wild hope are the initial steps toward fixing a unit that finished with a 74.5 percent success rate last season, third worst in the NHL.

“Not to go into too much detail, it’s his size, and it’s his intelligence and his stick,” Capuano said of Boldy, a 6-foot-2, 200-pound wing who has scored a combined 60 goals the past two seasons but has never played on an NHL PK. “He can really fit in a good role with us in that position with that size.”

Hynes said he expected Boldy, 23, to recover from his undisclosed injury by the end of camp and be available for the Wild’s Oct. 10 season opener against the Columbus Blue Jackets at Xcel Energy Center. But the injury is a setback, certainly for the special teams units.

Boldy had 10 goals and 25 power-play points last season, and the coaching staff thinks he can be a difference maker on a penalty kill that played a large role in the Wild missing the postseason last season for just the second time in 12 years.

Hynes was the U.S. head coach for the IIHF World Championships last May in Prague, where Boldy led all skaters with 14 points (six goals) in eight games. He also logged time on the penalty kill.

“We didn’t take too many penalties, but I got a couple of tries at it,” Boldly said Saturday. “It’s something I’d love to be a part of and try to help the team there if I can.”

It will have to wait.

“Yeah, Game 1, it’s probably a stretch,” said Capuano, who has been working with Hynes and fellow assistant coach Patrick Dwyer on the kill.

Boldy has played on the penalty kill units as part of U.S. development teams and at Boston College but has never been part of a PK unit since making his NHL debut for the Wild in January 2022. He sat in the PK meeting on Monday, and will again Tuesday, but now might not get any reps there in camp.

“It’s disappointing that that the injury did happen, because you can show them as much video as they want, but the repetition’s gonna drive the execution, right?” Capuano said. “So, you want to have a lot of reps, and unfortunately for him he won’t.”

Hynes acknowledged the injury will open opportunities for young forwards who will get higher profile roles in practices and preseason games, which resume Wednesday in Dallas, where prospects Liam Ohgren, Riley Heidt and Hunter Haight will get their game action of the fall.

“We have to juggle some things around,” Hynes said. “Obviously, Boldy’s on the power-play stuff, and then some line combos a little bit. So, it does open the door for other guys. And obviously those young kids you’re talking about, they are going to get into some games. That’s why they’re still in camp.”

In the meantime, Boldly can still work out — lift weights, ride a stationary bike — and isn’t expected to miss much, if any, of the regular season because of this.

“Matt was obviously having a very good training camp for the first few days, and had a really good summer,” Hynes said. “The good news is … we’re anticipating him near the end of camp and ready for the start of the season.”

Briefly

Forward Reese Johnson, a four-year veteran who had five points in 42 games with the Blackhawks last season, is out with an upper body injury and considered day-to-day, Hynes said. Michael Milne, a third-round 2022 draft pick who has played the past two seasons in Iowa, is out with an upper body injury. He skated on his own before practice on Monday.