On a recent trip back from Mount St Helens I stopped by the Lone Pine Cemetery just outside Ariel, Washington. I had never stopped here before.
Once in the cemetery it is quite interesting to see with the old section surrounded on two sides by a newer section
I walked down the hill to get a photo of the Cemetery sign and on my walk down I noticed two piles of rocks and some flowers next to a Rhododendron.
There at the bottom of the hill at the lowest point and the farthest away from the graves at the top of the hill were two graves. They were for "Indian Jim" and "Indian George".
As I stood looking at Indian Jim's and Indian George's Monuments I thought that we had come quite a ways since these two were buried here. At least we wouldn't treat these individuals like this today.
And then I got home and heard the news that several Congressmen and other individuals were called names in Washington, DC. And I thought, that no, we really haven't come very far from the days that Indian Jim and Indian George were treated as lower class people, buried at the bottom of the hill, while the good people of Ariel were buried at the top.I wish I were wrong.
David.
These last two photos are memorial stones, both native american men died before this cemetery was formed in 1931 and are not buried here. The cemetery that existed during their time flooded with the creation of Merwin Dam, and at the time of re-internment there were 2 native women remains transferred to this cemetery but they never received memorial stones, it is thought they are actually buried in these graves. Since their identity was not known in 1930 and many of the natives had left the area it is not surprising of their placement within the new cemetery.
ReplyDeleteDavid. I remeber these graves as a child. They used to have temp. Metal markers with their names on them. And the names are very wrong on the "now" headstones. They were two women. They were moved up from the cemetery with everyone else before the dam flooded.
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