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Officer seizes Indian artifacts

A man is accused of poaching 47 arrowheads on Burnt Island in the Lochloosa Wildlife Management Area in Alachua County.

By JUSTIN GEORGE
Published June 1, 2005

CRYSTAL RIVER - Forty-seven arrowheads illegally excavated from a state wildlife management area sit in the Crystal River office of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, awaiting their fate.

The flint arrowheads were discovered after a wildlife commission officer from Crystal River was patrolling the Lochloosa Wildlife Management Area in Alachua County and stumbled upon James Kirk Gates on May 23, commission spokeswoman Karen Parker said.

Gates, who was carrying a shovel, admitted to prying the arrowheads out of the ground, Parker said, while he was digging on Burnt Island within the park. He also told the officer that other artifacts he removed could be found at his home.

While it's okay to find or excavate arrowheads on private property, artifacts cannot be dug up on public land. If stumbled upon, they are supposed to be reported to park authorities.

In 1990, the federal government passed the Native American Repatriation Act, which prohibits the excavation or removal of American Indian artifacts from federal lands without the cooperation of native cultural groups.

Florida passed its own law, which similarly restricts the excavation, removal or destruction of artifacts on state land. Removing artifacts that lie above ground can be considered a misdemeanor, Parker said.

Because Gates, 27, was digging, he faces third-degree felony charges, Parker said.

Gates could not be reached Tuesday.

Parker said she doesn't know what will happen to the arrowheads, which remain in limbo until the investigation closes. They might be turned over to the University of Florida or they might be returned to the wildlife area.

People who poach American Indian artifacts on public land turn up a few times a year, Parker said. In 2001, looters dug more than 50 holes on a 1-acre site on the bank of the Withlacoochee River between Yankeetown and Inglis, plundering a midden, or trash mound, that was probably used from 2000 B.C. to the 11th or 12th Century.

Later in 2001, an Inglis resident and shell dealer was sentenced to six months in prison and $24,000 in fines and court costs after he was found to have sold artifacts illegally excavated from an American Indian burial mound.

The most famous plunderer of all in north central Florida was Clarence Bloomfield Moore, a self-taught archaeologist from Philadelphia, who barnstormed the South on paddleboats between 1891 until 1918, excavating burial mounds.

Moore spent a total of just 34 days at Crystal River in 1903, 1906 and sometime about 1918, according to a University of Florida researcher, prying nearly 40 intact ceramic vessels, hundreds of artifacts and the remains of at least 429 people from graves.

Much of Moore's collection ended up in the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. But there has been some movement toward trying to secure a loan from the Smithsonian Institution that could bring many of the objects back to Crystal River.

Justin George can be reached at 352 860-7309 or jgeorge@sptimes.com

[Last modified June 1, 2005, 00:38:18]