Lynda Mapes papers: The Tse-whit-zen Project, 1920-2008

In August 2003, the Washington State Department of Transportation began a construction project in Port Angeles, Washington. As they began to work, they uncovered an ancient village and burial site of ancestral importance to local Native American group, the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe. What resulted were years of tense negotiations between the tribe, the State, and the city, as all three parties attempted to grapple with the sensitivities of the situation. Seattle Times journalist Lynda Mapes was on the scene as it unfolded and has donated her investigative material to the UW Libraries. This project worked in three phases to catalog her inventory of items and begins to conceptualize an online exhibit that would detail the conflict.In addition to her reporting for the Times, Mapes wrote and published a book on the subject, Breaking Ground: the Lower Elwha Tribe and the Unearthing of Tse-whit-zen Village.