Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 10, Number 11, 1 November 1993 — Mōkapu kūpuna await return to final resting place [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Mōkapu kūpuna await return to final resting place

bv Deborah L. Ward The fate of more than 1,500 ancient Hawaiian skeletal remains excavated between 1938 and 1957 from the dunes at Mōkapu Peninsula, O'ahu, awaits the outcome of negotiations among OHA, Hui Mālama I

Nā Kūpuna, and the U.S. Navy. Bishop Museum, under contract to the Navy, recently completed an inventory of the remains, as well as associated items, whieh have been curated at Bishop Museum since the 1930s. OHA, the Native Hawaiian Historic

Preservation Council and Hui Mālama I Nā Kūpuna O Hawai'i Nei, will be receiving a copy of the final report. Under the terms of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), OHA and Hui Mālama I Nā Kūpuna O Hawai'i Nei are seeking the return of the remains and anticipate reinterment of the Mōkapu iwi at or near the original dunes burial site, where the present-day airstrip at the Kāne'ohe Marine Corps Air Station is located. Mōkapu was onee the site of several Hawaiian villages. Large fishponds, heiau, salt pans and marine shrines are mentioned in turn-of-the century reports. Its name was originally Moku-kapu, meaning sacred island. Kamehameha I was said to have selected the area as a meeting plaee with his ali'i. One legend says the first man, Kumuhonua, was made by the gods Kāne, Kanaloa, Kū and Lono, from red earth mixed with very dark bluish-black soil at the beach at Heleloa. Mōkapu is the site of one of the

» largest known burial areas in Hawai'i, and — until the Honokahua, Maui excavation — the most disturbed traditional cemetery. The Mōkapu bones were uncovered during construction of the U.S. Navy's Kāne'ohe Marine Corps Air Station from 1935-1955. Preliminary reports identified more than 1 ,000 sets of individuals. An interim burial plan memorandum of agreement between OHA and the Navy, specifies that any new inadvertent discoveries of human remains will be reported and the bones reburied at Mōkapu.

However, the Navy has not yet agreed to allow reinterment at Mōkapu of the remains now curated at Bishop Museum. OHA land officer Linda Delaney notes that the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act does not address the issue of eul-turally-appropriate reinterment, leaving this matter to native groups to determine. Native Hawaiians want to reinter the iwi kūpuna next to their original plaee of interment. The retum of the Mōkapu ancestors may

require additional Congressional oversight to successfully eonclude, Delaney says. The Native Hawaiian Historic Preservation Council has written to U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye for guidance and help in clarifying the repatriation of remains disturbed on public land and about the need for addressing associated costs of reinterment and a retum to the burial area. The cost of the Navy's inventory, for example, was paid by defense appropriations in the Legacy Program. Other cost estimates based on the number of individuals identified by the inventory, the preparation of tapa and lauhala for reinterment, and the construction of an above-ground reburial platform (to avoid the disturbance of any burials still in the ground), suggest it may require up to $300,000 to complete the Mōkapu repatriation. Additional moneys within national defense appropriations ean be provided for historic preservation mitigation purposes, and the Preservation Council is seeking such funding and support.