A team affiliated with the National Park Service is employing ground-penetrating radar to uncover the secrets hidden beneath the soil of the former Genoa Indian Industrial School in Genoa, Nebraska. Their mission is to locate the burial site of more than 80 Native American children who tragically lost their lives while attending the school. The excavation is scheduled to begin on Monday, July 10, 2023.
The Genoa Indian Industrial School was part of a nationwide network of boarding schools established to assimilate Indigenous children into mainstream white culture. These schools forcefully separated children from their families and suppressed their cultural heritage. Operating from 1884 to 1931, the school housed close to 600 students from over 40 tribes across the United States. Today, most of the school buildings have been demolished, leaving behind a vast field that conceals the forgotten cemetery where these children are believed to have been buried.
Locating the cemetery has been a longstanding pursuit for the community of Genoa, with the assistance of Native Americans, researchers, and state officials. The Nebraska Commission on Indian Affairs, led by Executive Director Judi gaiashkibos, has been actively involved in the investigation. gaiashkibos, whose mother attended the school in the late 1920s, acknowledges the painful history attached to the community but recognizes the importance of this search in facilitating healing and giving voice to the children who were lost.
Archival evidence, including newspaper clippings, records, and a student’s letter, suggests that at least 86 students perished at the school, mainly due to diseases like tuberculosis and typhoid. While researchers have identified the names of 49 deceased students, there remain 37 children whose identities remain unknown. Some of the deceased were returned to their respective tribal communities, but others were laid to rest on the school grounds, their final resting place obscured by the passage of time.
In the summer of last year, trained dogs with a keen sense of smell were deployed to locate the scent of decomposing remains. Their detection led to a narrow parcel of land, bordered by a farm field, railway tracks, and a canal, where the burial site is suspected to be. Furthermore, ground-penetrating radar scans conducted in November revealed features consistent with graves. However, it is only through this excavation that the truth can be revealed. Nebraska’s State Archaeologist, Dave Williams, indicates that the process may take several days. Once the burial features are exposed, the team will determine if any human remains are still present.
Should human remains be discovered, the State Archaeology Office, in collaboration with the Nebraska Commission on Indian Affairs, will decide the next course of action. Possibilities include creating a memorial at the site or repatriating the children’s bodies to their respective tribes. DNA analysis may provide insight into the geographic region the children originated from, but identifying specific tribes could prove challenging.
The federal government is also undertaking a comprehensive examination of the boarding school system. The U.S. Department of the Interior, led by Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American Cabinet secretary, has released an initial report in 2022 and is working on a subsequent report that delves deeper into the matter.
As the excavation commences, it serves as a poignant reminder of the tragic legacy of Native American boarding schools and presents an opportunity for healing, remembrance, and a reckoning with the past.
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