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will to persevere as a sovereign nation. Through everything that the Muscogee Nation has endured, the
collective memories of their past remain. When the Creeks were forced from their homelands they took
not only their earthly possessions, but also their ancient traditions; past second Chief Alfred Berryhill
make this point exceptionally clear: “We Creeks are proud our tradition of mound building. In our
homeland each ancestral town had its own mounds...Soils and mementos of these mounds were carried
west...from these heirlooms, new smaller mounds were started in our new towns.”50 Further evidence
of the deep connection between these ancient mounds and the modern Muscogee Nation can be found
in interviews with Joyce Bear, she recalls: “my mother used to talk about huge mounds that were in
Alabama and Georgia, which were referred to as the Old Homelands...she had only about a tenth grade
education, but she knew about them because she was taught through oral tradition.”51 The Native
American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act is one small step in ensuring that the Muscogee
peoples (and other tribes at countless other sites), who possess such a deep rooted relationship with the
Ocmulgee National Monument, can maintain their connection with their past.

50 Jay Miller, Ancestral Mounds: Vitality and Volatility of Native America. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2015), ix.
51 Richard Townsend, Hero Hawk and Open Hand, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004) , 188.