Actually the original sign was Indian Diggings For Sale it was a big yellow and red lettered sign over a tourist trap in Upper Michigan on Highway 2 between St Ignace and Escanaba. The Year was 1965 and I was with the Great Lakes Indian Youth Alliance and we were demostrating to close graves that had been opened to provide tourists with entertainment. The door quickly slamed shut and someone inside held it. We eventually pushed it open. there on a table under glass sat a complete Indian Grave. The store was filled with the usual tourist trap items and a few burial items. The other site we went to that day was a largr gravel pit with a Huge Sign Indian Burial Site over 200 exposed skeletons,etc,etc. The owner of the large gravel pit had exposed a large Sacred burial ground and charged admission to walk through and gawk at the exposed bodies of Indian people at eye level. Several Michigan State Police met us in full riot gear at the gate. Eventually, we all adults, Elders,women and children entered and filled up the site and presented our argument as to the bewildered owner as to why the graves had to be covered and his thriving business had to be shut down. We then left peacefully without incident as we had promised the State Police Riot Squad.The store and several other tourist places had bones from these Sacred Grounds that they had purchased from this guy to display. The Fort Mackinaw even had a childs complete burial display right in the middle of the foyer under glass for all to see. Eventually we were successful in getting all of this activity stopped in Upper Michigan. Unfortunately things really havn't changed much even with all the laws, demonstrations, and awareness. Sometimes today, in 2006, I wonder if anyone really cares! I have heard through the moccasin telegraph that even some Indian Casino's have removed graves that were in the way of progress! I don't have anything specific or I would certainly write about that here too.
My mixed blood friend who has my skin color but who is a Certified Member of the Rosebud Lakota Nation loves to ride his Harley all over the country. Last year he was in one of the southern states,he stopped in one of the typical community roadside diners for a quick breakfast. It was a community hang out and it soon became evident to him that the residents were very excited about something more than grits and johnny cakes! All too soon he found out what, they had discovered "treasure" in a large Indian Burial Ground nearby and nearly every one in the diner was going to get rich selling the" diggans" "Stuff" on eBay. they invited him to the "diggans" Site as the Sacred Burial site had quickly became.

He told them thanks,but no thanks!Climbed on his Harley and got out of Dodge!

I CANNOT BELIEVE IN 2006 THAT PEOPLE ARE STILL DIGGING.

Yet I expect that if we havn't seen them yet the Grave items uncovered by Katrina will soon show up on EBAY.If the weather or some other unusual happening occurs uncovered graves are fair game.
Last year I attended a Auction at the APPLE TREE AUCTION HOUSE in Newark Ohio. They have a auction site here on EBAY,there among a rather shoddy Indian Collection clearly labeled in plastic bags were several items labeled "Taken from Indian burials" that was 2005, unbelievable! there is no excuse for this kind of professional ignorance of the burial laws! I stopped at a Estate sale last summer and two young people had questionable items, I asked the orgin of the items displayed ? They said," from the ground." I said,from graves? They said,"no but we don't agree with the laws against that."We are members of the local Archaeology Society."
 I have seen burial items consistantly from estate sales,to flea markets to antique stores all accross the country. In Ontario Canada, near Brantford a man had a few items in his second hand store. I dress like a trader so soon he opened up to me he said.,"Would you be interested in any Indian artifacts?"" My friend and I dig at least twice a week. We dig together at night, he gets one grave everything in it, then I get the next everything in it." After about a hour of listening to his morbid stories the trust built,He said,"come with me" , he took me to another building with ,according to his estimate, over $300,000.00 dollars worth of  burial items. He said he was having a difficult time selling them and he said, give me  $67,000 cash for everything and you can take" it " all back to Michigan. One thing I remember well is a full body necklace of beautiful blue graduated chevron beads and he described in detail how they had to sift the dust and bones to get each bead, and how difficult it was after they got it to sort and to restring it beginning with the small beads to the large 2 inch drop bead. I left there quite sick to my stomach. When I got home to Michigan, I called the authorities  both U.S. and Canadian and asked them if I could work undercover for them to put a stop to this activity? I explained that diggers, grave robbers,always opened up to me. I said let me purchase that $300,000.00 collection.They said no we have people handling that. There aren't funds to cover that type of activity. It doesn't have priority right now,eagle feather trafficking has priority.
I saw a listing last year on Ebay,I wish now I would have copied it, the young man had a burial item listed and said he didn't know what it was, but his grandpa dug it up from a Indian Grave on the family's Wisconsin Farm! I quickly e-mailed him and he took the listing off.
Folks I have been around Indian people enough to know that there are dire cosequences for tampering with Indian Graves. The consequences often do not happen soon after the graves are uncovered. I don't believe it is a curse either like Hamlet or Shakespeare.I don't think it follows a specific time line. But I know of several cases all of them are true, where horrrible things have happened to people who dug up graves.Over time I am going to present them here.It does appear to me that a very negative force or power is unleashed when graves are tampered with and opened up! I have heard of other cases. I know some of you out there could add yours. Perhaps all is best summed up by this quote from Chief Seattle, also found in the Pettifor article.

"The WhiteMan will never be alone. Let him be just and deal kindly with my people,for the dead are not powerless. (Chief Seattle,1854 in Turner,1989" taken from the article , The Reburial Controversy by Eric Pettifor.

CASE (1) The "wise person" had told me that a Dr from Chicago had dug up three graves and robbed them. He suffered nearly the loss through,one death after another, of his whole family until he,searching for answers, went to a Chicago psychic and she told him he had to take the bones and items back to the graves and rebury them. He had made a ash tray out of one of the skulls and it sat in his office. My Dad watched these graves for years to make sure they were never dug up again. As he neared his own death he asked me to take over that responsibility.I fear for them now as a lot of development is taking place near them and I do not live close enough to watch over them.

CASE (2) In another case a Young Woman was concerned that the Muskegon Michigan Sewer and Water works was going to build a huge pipeline through the Hopewell (400 to 600 BC) mounds near her subdivision. To make a point of what they were going to be destroying she dug into the mounds and removed several peices of the Hopewell copper jewerly personal items and had them displayed on two tables when we arrived to the very political charged meeting. A second meeting was set up about a month later, this young woman was not there. I asked her friend where is Mrs So in So. He said, "didn't you hear? "She was in a Auto accident and was killed on the freeway after our meeting last month." I had been told by a Native Elder that, "if you steal from the dead you will join them quicker than your time." She certainy did!

Case (3)  Moses was a popular Ojibwe from Sault St. Marie,(I Changed his name and Tribe to protect the family)Moses was working on a construction site and they dug into a grave. The foreman said, "just push all that #*X#* back in place and pour the comcrete and keep your mouth's shut! Moses,against his better judgement. snatched up the small buckskin pouch quickly from the grave and took it home. He opened the pouch and it had the red war paint that warriors always used. He smeared it on his face to tease his young wife when he arrived home. . She really freaked out. After supper he tried to wash it off but it didn't come off easily. That night he became deathly ill. He thought he was going to die,his wife took him to the Sault War Memorial Hospital but they could find nothing specific wrong and sent him back home. He told me,he became more sick as the night continued. He thought he was going to die. He realized during his fitful sleep and nightmare that the warrior was really mad because he took his pouch. The next day he took the pouch back and placed it as near to the grave as possible. Within a day he was well again. He carefully related this story to me.


My fellow writer Eric Pettifor author of the  "The Reburial Controversy" has written of the similar beliefs of several different Indian Nations.

" Bones should become dust. Mother earth lacks these bodies;if they are not returned there will be earthquakes and mother earth will take all these people. (Arizona Inter Tribal Council,inHubert,1989)"

Perhaps more people will listen as the Earth and us become more and more ravaged by unusual storms and earthquakes?
 
                     THERE IS NO GOOD DEFENSE FOR  DIGGING OR ROBBING GRAVES

From a Reburial experience:

"We re- buried the people the Indian People from the University Museum that night,The young Ojibwe Holy Man conducted the ceremony, he carefully removed each package of bones from the plastic bags"baggies" and placed them in the Grave. They had been in the University Museum for many years. At the end of the ceremony the Ojibwe Grandma sang a burial song in her language.
A Eagle swooped four times over the small gathering and screamed loudly into the night air! The first swooop was so loud that we all jumped,somewhat frightened, and then laughed with relief and joy."
We knew without doubt that we had done the right thing.

I apologise to my Elders,relatives, friends,customers for sharing these words here but I can no longer stand by and watch this happen over and over again! Without saying something. I also made a commitment to the Traditional Elders and Chiefs that I would write this Guide on Ebay this year of 2006.

My own GGGGrandfather, George Gillaspie who came over here sometime between 1730-1803 lies in a unmarked grave in Amherst County Virgina, He died in 1803 his dust is now in  a field well plowed in the Piney River Valley by generations of farmers! Thank God no one can any longer dig him up! The house he re- built in Virginia Called Athlone Plantation didn't burn down until 1996.

IF YOU KNOW SOMEONE IS DIGGING CALL NAGPRA or EMAIL Tim_Mckeown@nps.gov

If you know someone is digging or destroying graves do something about it! If you see or purchase something on Ebay or elswhere and suspect it might be from a grave call or email Ebay or the authorities at NAGPRA  Tim_Mckeown@nps.gov
Watch out for old beads,stonework, Hudson Bay metals,metal religious artifacts,bones, are things to watch out for.You can usually see bits of dirt or other signs of being in the Earth or grave for a long time.

Thanks for reading my ramblings,
Thanks to Kathyleen,Ed,Mouz,Paul,Butch,Judy,Jim,Mary,Betty,George,John,Arnold,Ben,Miko,Cris.......

Sincerely,
Woody

UPDATE: 5/6/06
I read a story that I wanted to share with readers of this Guide. It was written on 5/6/06 it is about the Pocahontas Parkway in Richmond,Va. Highway 895. It is considered to be the most haunted highway in the United States by some but gets very little coverage in the National Press. There have been a few stories in the Richmond Times-Dispatch and the in the recent story in The Sidney Morning Herald,5/6/06 written by Scott Rochfort,"Ghosts dead against toll road." This is typical of the first hand experience I have discussed widely with other folks all over the U.S.A. where Indian graves have been disturbed.
According to the story there have been several sightings of Woodland Indians on and around that highway. They are very angry. Some have been in groups chanting and singing,some have been seen carrying burning tourches.Often as mentioned earlier builders and others see graves and burials as a major problem with development and simply do not report them build right over and through them,come hell or high water.Usually they build without permits,and disturb the burials at odd hours with massive equipment. Recently here in Ohio,a Coal mining company bought the coal rights under a grave yard for $100,000.00 the trustees were going to use the money to improve all the graveyards in the surrounding area at least that is what they said after the public became outraged.. But the White Settlers were still alive who buried relatives there and they knew that coal mines in the area already sold, often open up
and the topsoil drops into open holes and that the whole graveyard could possibly drop into the mine.They protested and blocked the sale. Things like this happen everyday in Indian Country and the Pochontas Parkway is one major example of the aftermath.It is time we really reconsider what is "progress!"and at whose and what expense or we are going to manifest our destiny!
Another personal incident,back home near Dublin Michigan, several years ago,I was told that the Manistee County Road Comission had hit some graves in a local gravel pit and I went to the site. Talked with the forman, he said,yes we hit something that appeared to be burials. I said what did you do with them. He took great pleasure in telling me that "we ran them right through the crusher with a sneer on his face.I said how many were there. He said," two or three" with a shrug of his shoulders.I said, wasn't there arrow heads or stone artifacts with them he said," we didn't pay any attention but I think there was they went right through the crusher with everything else." I firmly believe that  we are as screwed up in our thinking about death in our culture as we are about sex and there is cosequences we pay everyday for this ignorance everyday.I will believe this until my own death and learn of the Great Mystery waiting for me there! I personally believe our individual death should be as beautiful and Sacred as our individual birth! More later,  Thanks,and in deep Gratitude,Woody

Update 5/12/06
Probably one of the most despicable examples of grave digging and looting is that by the grandfather of President George Bush,Prescott Bush and his cohorts and Army personnel when they dug the bones of Geronimo the Chiricahua Apache Chief  from their burial place at Fort Sill,Oklamona.They captured  bones and other grave items in an apparent college prank to found the infamous and controversial Yale Skull and Bone Society. Type those words in any search engine and  you will discover well documented article after article about this secret society and its members. The most recent is by Stephen Singer,who writes in Common Dreams News Center May 9,06,and quotes a letter found by Marc Wortman a reasearcher,that was  written by Winter Mead in 1918, it reads and I quote,The Skull of the worthy Geronimo the Terrible,exhumed from its tomb at Fort Sill by your club.....is now safe inside the (Tomb) together with his well worn femurs,bit,&saddle horn.Absolutely despicable in attitude and intent! It is a well known fact that both President George Bush and  Sen.John Kerry belong to the secret Skull and Bones Society. Perhaps the root of the personal difficulties of both aspiring leaders are directly related to their involvement in this society and the fact that even though they are now very powerful people they have apparently done absolutely nothing to return the burial remains or loot to the Geronimo family or the Chiricahua Apache tribe. President Bush certainly could come clean on this issue as a matter of business and order these remains and loot to be returned to the family for a safe burial. He could right a major intergenerational and intercultural wrong that has existed since the 1900's by his simple act. What if the moccasins were on another foot and someone had dug up his Grandfather Prescott Bush's skull to place in a secret vault at Harvard to kiss in a weird secret ceremony of aspiring fearful runny nosed graduates?
Respectfully,
 Woody

Update 5/20/06 From a Reader: I quote:

I live in Tahlequah OK,Cherokee Country. The Indian Hospital here,named Hastings. The new renovations were built on top of a burial ground and their bodies were not removed.Their gravestones were placed across the street on a empry lot. I worked in a department that was ontop of the burial ground as a custodian,so being there at nighttimeI came across a lot of things. Like,I would not be able to run a machine at night time,or you would get a creepy feeling as though someone was standing behind you and whan you would look behind a machine would loose power for no apparent reason. There was also a young child who would be crying.I am not knowledgeable about any of that,but I do know that they are disturbed.

From a Night Shift Custodian,Hastings Indian Hospital,Tahlequah,Oklahoma
Thanks for sharing your information,
Sincerely,
Woody


CASE 4:
I was in a private home in Michigan. A Elderly Odawa Man had shown me several beautiful natural grave stones that a local Catholic Priest had him remove from a small cemetery near the Church in Walkerville,Michigan because he felt they were too pagan to be in the Catholic Cemetery. We had someting to eat and discussed what could be done about the situation into the night.He wanted to return the stones to the Cemetery.
The Electric lights started to blink on and off throughout the Living Room during our discussion and prayers for no apparent reason,we checked them and could find nothing wrong.

UPDATE: Oct 14,06
Port Huron Michigan woman attemps to sell unidentified human remains on eBay recently. The issue made several headlines and the Port Huron Police contacted eBay. The sale was removed from eBay because it violated a policy against selling human remains. There was one bid placed on the remains for $500. from Satan's Child before it was removed. The remains were sent to an anthropologist at Michigan State University for further examination.
When will they ever learn? Is nothing Sacred? Woody

NOTICE:NOTICE:NOTICE: JUST IN
If you want to read something alarming read, Body Brokers by Annie Cheney
Inside America's Underground Trade in Human Remains ,Copyright 2006
Broadway Books,New York.