“The Makah, Lower Elwha Klallam, Jamestown S’Klallam, 1 Port Gamble S’Klallam, Skokomish, Squaxin, Chehalis, Shoalwater Bay, Quinault, Quileute, and Hoh all live on or near the peninsula. Several of their reservations, ranging from 200 to almost 200,000 acres, border the park. Many aspects of park management relate to the tribal connection to the landscape. In 1990, the park began a research project to look at these traditional ties. The project has provided a compelling amount of information on the relationship between the tribes and the park. …[Information that]…. —highlighted indigenous uses of the peninsula’s interior unrecognized by popular accounts and, indeed, by most of the non-Indian community…. Ethnographic interviews alerted us to ongoing significance of the interior, where people still acquire spiritual power…. These interviews, and walks through the area with tribal members, led to informative discussions about past and present uses of the park, enhancing our perspectives of its cultural landscapes.

The result of the research was an ethnographic overview and assessment that provides park managers with a historical and contemporary foundation for understanding relationships with the tribes, including treaty rights, legislation, and official government policies. Such research, coupled with tribal cooperation fostered by NPS ethnographic initiatives, has facilitated compliance with laws and regulations that call for tribal consultation, such as the National Historic Preservation Act, the Archaeological Resources Protection Act, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the American Indian Religious Freedom Act… (Wray Spring 2001)”

To read more about the research and its’ outcome go to: http://crm.cr.nps.gov/issue.cfm?volume=24&number=05

See: Jacilee Wray Tribes Write Book About the Indigenous Peoples of the Olympic Peninsula