Free Republic

A Washington State middle school hosted a licking competition between students and staff, which prompted outcry from parents A Washington State middle school hosted a licking competition between students and staff, which prompted outcry from parents over the "horrifying" and "highly vile" game. In a video recorded by appalled students at Desert Hills Middle School in Kennewick, minor students and adult teachers are shown licking marshmallow cream off of either side of two clear plexiglass panes at the same time during a competition at a school a pep rally on March 31. Students in the crowd could be heard screaming,...

A Washington school board approved a policy on Aug. 24 prohibiting the teaching of Critical Race Theory (CRT) in classrooms. The Kennewick School Board in Kennewick, Washington, voted 5-0 on a policy which bans educators from teaching students CRT or that “their race determines their value or worth.” The policy requires that students learn “factual” U.S. history in all disciplines at school. (RELATED: ‘Find Another Job’: Oklahoma Officials Respond To Teacher Quitting Over CRT Ban) The policy bans “indoctrination” and teaching “the belief that the U.S. is fundamentally or systemically racist.” Curriculums now under review by the passing of the...

May 6—KENNEWICK, Wa. — In the minutes after Katie Summers hit and killed a 31-year-old moped rider, she didn't stop to help him or call 911. She made a U-turn and parked in a nearby lot, but didn't approach police when they arrived. Her inaction drove Benton County Superior Court Judge Alex Ekstrom to order the 31-year-old mother of two to prison for the high end of the state sentencing range — two years and two months. "Ms. Summers on the 21st of August of 2018 you killed a man. You did this through the disregard of your obligations as...

A pair of thieves disguised as nurses stole packages off porches in a Washington state community amid the coronavirus pandemic, authorities said Saturday. Kennewick police shared the photos of two women decked out in dark blue scrubs and approaching homes in the city, located in southeastern Washington along the Columbia River. One woman wore surgical gloves. The porch pirates shared a maroon sedan, according to security camera footage released by police. While the suspects looked the part of health care workers, police said they “do not believe they are actual nurses” and asked the public for help in identifying the...

Police say a man in Washington reported his truck was stolen — as he happened to be nearby allegedly robbing a store himself. William Kelley called authorities on Sunday around 6 a.m. to report that he left his keys on the seat of his red 1992 Chevrolet pickup truck in Kennewick, a city roughly 140 miles southwest of Spokane, and "someone just stole it." Kelley said he saw a man riding a bicycle who "discovered the keys and then threw his back bike in the bed of the truck and fled," according to a Facebook post from the Kennewick Police...

A 46-year-old Somali refugee identified as Hussein Hassan attacked a police officer in Kennewick, Washington, over the weekend with a large sword, striking at the officer’s head before he was shot and killed. A spokesman for the police said two officers responded to a 9-1-1 call at 6:38 p.m. Sunday about a man walking down Olympia Street near 10th Avenue armed with a sword. The two officers arrived on the scene at the same time in separate cars at about 6:40 p.m. One officer got out of his car to confront Hassan and police say the man started swinging the...

Army Corps of Engineers working with native American tribes to coordinate burial A local tribe, the Umatilla, had claimed the Kennewick Man as an ancestor; the Native American group wanted to lay the skeleton to rest according to custom.

In July 1996, two college students were wading in the shallows of the Columbia River near the town of Kennewick, Wash., when they stumbled across a human skull. At first the police treated the case as a possible murder. But once a nearly complete skeleton emerged from the riverbed and was examined, it became clear that the bones were extremely old — 8,500 years old, it would later turn out. The skeleton, which came to be known as Kennewick Man or the Ancient One, is one of the oldest and perhaps the most important — and controversial — ever found...

Niede Guidon still remembers her astonishment when she glimpsed the paintings. Preserved amid the bromeliad-encrusted plateaus that tower over the thorn forests of northeast Brazil, the ancient rock art depicts fierce battles among tribesmen, orgiastic scenes of prehistoric revelry and hunters pursuing their game, spears in hand. “These were stunning compositions, people and animals together, not just figures alone,” said Dr. Guidon, 81, remembering what first lured her and other archaeologists in the 1970s to this remote site where jaguars still prowl. Hidden in the rock shelters where prehistoric humans once lived, the paintings number in the thousands. Some are...

The discovery of Kennewick Man, the name given to the 9,200 year-old skeleton unearthed in southern Washington nearly a decade ago, has unearthed plenty of questions among anthropologists and tribal members about what Kennewick Man's life might have been like. To Burke Museum anthropological archaeologist Peter Lape though, the biggest question at hand is whether peer review, a time-honored scientific practice, is being ignored by leading forensic anthropologist Douglas Owsley, whose team has been the only one allowed to study Kennewick Man's bones since they were discovered in the mid-90s. Lape, the curator of achaeology at the Burke Museum and...

Owsley says study shows that not only wasn't Kennewick Man Indian, he wasn't even from the Columbia Valley, which was inhabited by prehistoric Plateau tribes.Tribal members listened for hours to Owsley's highly detailed presentation, but it did not budge their conviction that Kennewick Man is a part of their people's past — and needs to be reburied.

By week's end, Ryota Yamada hopes to slip his sea kayak gently into the Columbia River at Clover Island, embarking on the first leg of a 10,000-mile adventure to Japan. The retired scientist who did nanotechnological research intends to paddle downriver to the ocean, then via the Inland Passage north to Alaska, and eventually across the Bering Strait to the Asian continent. It will take him four summers, but if he succeeds in reaching his homeland, Yamada said, he will have shown that Kennewick Man could have made his way by boat 9,300 years ago from Japan to North America....

Ancient Caucasian Remains in America The Ainu in North America Archeological anomalies that suggest Amerindians were not the first Americans Kennewick Man Spirit Cave Mummy Wizards Beach Man Gordon Creek Woman Penon Woman The "Mummy People" of Alaska A handful of skeletal remains have come to light in recent years which suggests that the Modern Amerindians, descended primarily from Mongolian stock were not truly the first Americans. The Ainu race of Japan appears the be the last remaining vestiges of a race that once roamed the Pacific Areas of Asia and the Americas, theiry skeletal remains may possibly be related...

Scientists protest efforts to give Indian tribes control over ancient man's remains The Associated PressPublished: November 30, 2007 WASHINGTON: Scientists hoping to study the ancient skeleton known as Kennewick Man are protesting efforts on two fronts that they say could block them from examining one of the oldest and most complete set of bones ever found in North America. For a third time in four years, the scientists are opposing a bill in the U.S. Senate that would allow federally recognized American Indian tribes to claim ancient remains even if they cannot prove a link to a current tribe. They...

Next Kennewick Man will need protection Published Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 The court decision to allow scientists to study the ancient skeleton known as Kennewick Man has aided humankind's quest for knowledge. Unfortunately, it also spawned a congressional effort to change federal law to keep science from learning anything about the next Kennewick Man. U.S. Rep. Doc Hastings is trying to thwart the move with proposed legislation of his own. Good for him. With so many unanswered questions about man's future, we've never had a greater need to understand our past. The Kennewick Man ruling, upheld by the 9th Circuit...

Last week, Hillary Clinton condemned the Bush administration’s “open season on open inquiry” and promised to end its “war on science.” She might have chosen a better target, closer to home: the Senate, where the Indian Affairs Committee has just approved a two-word change to federal law that could render the scientific study of pre-Columbian history in the United States virtually impossible. One of the first casualties of the revision would be Kennewick Man — the popular name for a set of 9,300-year-old bones found along the Columbia River near Kennewick, Wash., in 1996. Human remains of that age are...

Senate bill could untie Kennewick Man bones Published Thursday, October 4th, 2007 By Annette Cary, Herald staff writer A Senate committee has approved a bill that could clear the way for Native Americans to claim the ancient bones of Kennewick Man. This is the third time the change has been proposed to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. It would ensure federally recognized tribes could claim ancient remains even if a direct link to a tribe can't be proven. Tribes have pushed for a change to the law since the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2004...

Female bones excavated from the bubbling asphalt in 1914 used to be mounted in the museum, alongside a life-sized dummy purporting to resemble the woman to whom the bones had belonged. The exhibit was called La Brea Woman. La Brea means "the tar" in Spanish. La Brea Woman probably died from injuries inflicted by a blunt instrument: a piece of bone is missing from the top of her skull... Scientists believe that La Brea Woman died with her dog by her side, since canine bones were found near her remains. La Brea Woman is 9,000 years old, has a hole...

Anthropologists Back Native American Claims The case of Kennewick Man – or the Ancient One – as Native Americans refer to him, dragged through the courts for years before Judge John Jelderks found that he could not be defined Native American under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. A recent case regarding repatriation of even older remains and artifacts from Spirit Cave, Nev., suggests that the Kennewick Man case should be used as a legal precedent and that the remains of Spirit Cave Man are not Native American. Four University of New Mexico anthropologists have written an article...

The First Americans By Sharon Begley and Andrew Murr Newsweek, April 26, 1999 New digs and old bones reveal an ancient land that was a mosaic of peoples—including Asians and Europeans. Now a debate rages: who got here first? 'Skull wars:' Facial reconstruction of the 'Spirit Cave Man,' based on bones found in Spirit Cave, Churchill County, Nevada (David Barry--Courtesy Nevada State Museum; facial reconstruction by Sharon Long) As he sat down to his last meal amid the cattails and sedges on the shore of the ancient lake, the frail man grimaced in agony. A fracture at his left temple...