SAULT STE. MARIE, Mich. – The federal government has removed an obelisk monument from Indigenous burial grounds in Michigan’s eastern Upper Peninsula.

On Nov. 4, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers removed the monument from Brady Park in Sault Ste. Marie, where it was built on known Indigenous burial grounds for Native peoples, including Bay Mills Indian Community in Brimley and the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa.

The nearby Soo Locks were opened in 1855 to accommodate shipping traffic between Lake Superior and the St. Marys River. The stone pillar was built in 1905 in the downtown park along East Water Street to signify the lock system’s 50 th anniversary.

For decades tribal communities sought to have the monument removed from their burial grounds – known as “Wudjiwong” in the Nativ

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