Dakota leaders are expressing concern that this year’s Pioneer Press Treasure Hunt medallion was hidden at a site they say is holy and sacred.

Treasure hunters found the medallion Saturday at the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary in St. Paul. Although the sanctuary is designated a public park, a nonprofit has partnered with the city to have the park recognized as a sacred space. Initial funding has come together for a cultural and interpretative site to be called the Wakan Tipi Center at the entrance of the Bruce Vento sanctuary.

Prairie Island Indian Community President Shelley Buck speaks at the Treasure Island Center ribbon cutting in St. Paul on Jan. 16, 2018. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)

Hiding the medallion in a “sacred site is pretty disappointing because for us it’s a place of prayer and a final resting place for our people,” said Shelley Buck, former chair of the Prairie Island Tribal Council, who now serves as vice chair of the Wakan Tipi Awanyankapi board.

The nature sanctuary where the medallion was found is adjacent to Indian Mounds Regional Park, an area that sits atop Dayton’s Bluff east of downtown St. Paul and is considered one of a handful of spiritual and sacred holy centers for Dakota people in the metro area. If medallion hunters were searching in churches and cemeteries, people would be appalled, Buck said.

“We may call it different things but it’s our place of worship. We don’t have a church or synagogue, but it’s the same. We worship outdoors, we pray outdoors. We just ask for the same respect you would give your own (places of worship and burial),” Buck said.

Lori Swanson, a marketing consultant who directs the Pioneer Press Treasure Hunt, said the nature sanctuary will be off limits for future hunts, which is already the case for Indian Mounds park. “We respect history, culture and everybody who cares about it, and we take concerns about the Pioneer Press Treasure Hunt seriously,” she said.

This year’s medallion was hidden a few feet off the bike trail on the southern edge of the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, near a fence between the park and a rail yard.

“Early clues included a note that the medallion was set on open ground to discourage potential disturbance of plant and wildlife,” Swanson said. “Clue explanations included history about the area and about how work is going on now ‘to reclaim the land and restore it to its natural beauty.’”

Swanson said Treasure Hunt boundaries will exclude the park going forward “in light of that work, a central aim of which is to redesignate the area from a park to a sacred place.”

“We’re grateful to the Dakota leaders, treasure hunters and residents who communicated their concerns about where we hid the medallion this year,” Swanson said.

Wakan Tipi Center

Steps are well underway to change the sanctuary’s designation through the Wakan Tipi Awanyankapi’s partnership with the city of St. Paul. Part of those efforts include the construction of the Wakan Tipi Center at the end of the sanctuary farthest from Wakan Tipi, a sacred cave in the northern portion of the sanctuary also known as Carver’s Cave.

A man is silhouetted inside Wakan Tipi, then commonly referred to as Carver’s Cave, located near the Mississippi River at the base of Dayton’s Bluff in St. Paul, in a black and white photo taken in approximately 1920. (Courtesy of the Minnesota Historical Society)

“Two significant sites within this landscape are Wakan Tipi (Carvers Cave), a sacred cave site within Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, and the Dakota burial mounds above the cave, along the bluff, in Indian Mounds Regional Park,” according to wakantipi.org. “The activities here have been extensively documented in the historical record, and especially in the journals of Jonathan Carver in 1766-1767, when he lived with the Dakota near this site for six months. In his journals, Carver describes beautiful landscape and extensive rock art within the cave entrance at Wakan Tipi that tell of ancient stories and the holiness of the cave.”

The nonprofit spawned from resident efforts to turn the “heavily polluted, neglected, and forgotten” area of the sanctuary into a city park in 1997.

East Side and Lowertown activists joined together to restore the site by creating Wakan Tipi Awanyankapi (formerly known as Lower Phalen Creek Project). According to the nonprofit’s website, the goal was to restore the land and create a nature sanctuary that offers “high quality native wildlife habitat and protection for this culturally significant place of power, all in the heart of the urban core.”

In 2005, the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary was opened to the public. As part of the efforts to educate the public about the importance of the area, a cultural landscape study was conducted by the city. As a result, last fall signs were installed letting visitors know that “they are in a sacred place of burial and there are relatives of those buried who are still here.”

In addition, posted QR codes now link visitors to videos of Native American individuals talking about the site and additional “physical cues that remind visitors they are in a special, sacred space,” according to the city’s messaging plan.

Dakota leaders have raised similar concerns about park installments previously planned on the Indian Mounds site. Instead of installing a playground, the city redirected that money toward the cultural study of the park.

‘Education is key’

It’s “frustrating” because incidents like this continue to happen and will continue to happen until the space is officially recognized and designated as a holy and sacred space, said Maggie Lorenz, executive director of Wakan Tipi Awanyankapi.

Until that happens, people won’t understand that many seemingly innocuous activities, such as walking dogs through the area, are harmful and desecrate the holy land, Lorenz said in a phone interview on Sunday.

Because the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary is still considered a city park until a designation occurs, education is key, she said.

The building of the community center will help, along with signs and outdoor exhibits put in place this spring to help educate the public about the space while the city and the nonprofit organization hammer out the complexities of re-designation of the sanctuary, Lorenz said.

Construction of the Wakan Tipi Center is currently out for bids through the city, she said.

There are a lot of areas to consider including “caring for our unhoused relatives while still not wanting them to camp at the site, the need — and want — to recognize Bruce Vento and all he’s done for the east side. And naming this appropriately as a sacred site,” she said.

When something like a treasure hunt creates a lot of foot traffic, it highlights the need to speed up the process of getting the area designated as a sacred place, she said.

It “urges (our organization), the tribes and the city to bump this work up on our priority list,” she said. “It does take time, investment, involvement and engagement, but the longer we wait, the more opportunities there are for desecration.

“People are not even intentionally out there trying to cause harm, but without clear education about the work we are doing with the city, there is no way people can realize the harm.”

Lorenz said the area shouldn’t be considered a former sacred space: It is an active spiritual space where people still go to pray.

And visitors don’t have to be Dakota to spend time there, she pointed out.

“We would want to see people (from any background) visiting for purposes of prayer, mindfulness and mediation,” she said.

In the metro area, there are five such sacred spaces: the entire Indian Mounds park (including the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary) is considered one. Others are Bdote (Ft. Snelling state park where the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers come together); Oheyawahi (also known as Pilot’s Knob in Mendota); Mini Owe Sin (also known as Coldwater Spring by Minnehaha Park); and Owamniyomni (at St. Anthony Falls). One site, Wita Wanagi (also known as Spirit Island), is now gone. It was quarried and its stones used for construction of buildings such as the mills, Lorenz said.

The Wakan Tipi center is expected to open in late 2025. The 7,500 square foot center will house public program and restoration teams to educate people about the sacred space but also provide active stewardship and restoration. It will include indoor and outdoor exhibits and interior classrooms, a teaching kitchen to “revitalize traditional food preparation” as well as community spaces.

“It’s super important work,” said St. Paul Parks and Recreation director Andy Rodriguez.

“I think this is a site where we have the opportunity to set a standard for other park agencies,” he said. “We have an opportunity to set an example for the nation, honestly. We’re leaders in this area and looking to define a path for how this will go forward in future.”

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