A federal grant will support study of a petroglyph site in Bellows Falls by a local Indigenous group, the Elnu Abenaki.
Those involved say it’s just the first step in promoting education on local Native American history in the Connecticut River Valley.
Two sets of carvings depict over a dozen minimalist faces, some featuring what look like horns or antennae. First discovered by white settlers in the late 19th century, the petroglyphs are believed to have been carved by members of the Abenaki tribe anywhere from several hundred to 3,000 years ago, according to archeologists.
The town of Rockingham, which includes the village of Bellows Falls, in collaboration with the Elnu Abenaki, received a nearly $37,000 underrepresented communities grant from the National Park Service to support two years of research around the site, beginning this fall.
Roger Longtoe Sheehan, chief of the Elnu Abenaki, said he hopes the project will increase awareness about the Abenaki and the landscape they traditionally inhabited.
“The people in Bellows Falls, most of the people there didn’t know much about why this stuff is there. Why are these pictographs there? Why are there burials there?” he said.
According to Longtoe Sheehan, the Great Falls was a popular fishing location, and underground spirits were believed to live below the turbulent waters.
Rich Holschuh, historic preservation officer for the Elnu, and Gail Golec, an archeologist, are leading the project.
The Elnu received state recognition in 2011 and are one of four state-recognized Abenaki groups.
Recently, those groups have received scrutiny. At an event at the University of Vermont in late April, members of the Odanak First Nation, an Abenaki reserve in Quebec, questioned the legitimacy of the Vermont Abenaki.
To Holschuh — an Elnu spokesperson — receiving the grant indicates that Vermont’s Abenaki fit the funding’s intended target: underrepresented communities.
“(The project) is the right thing to do, and it’s the right time to do it,” he said.
According to Holschuh, the study will look at the petroglyphs in their context, connecting other important Indigenous sites in the Connecticut River valley.
Titled “Kchi Pontegok,” (pronounced kit-SEE-POHN-tuh guk), which means “at the Great Falls” in Western Abenaki language, the project will study the two panels of petroglyphs near the Great Falls along the Connecticut River below Vilas Bridge.
A similar petroglyph site is located downstream, where the Connecticut and West Rivers meet in Brattleboro, Golec said. She hopes to study the Bellows Falls site in context with the Brattleboro location.
Across New England, similar petroglyphs are extremely rare, said Jess Robinson, Vermont’s state archeologist. According to Robinson, the Vermont carvings could be as old as 3,000 years, but are likely more recent. Because scientists cannot carbon-date carvings, and many sites have been re-etched over the years, accurately dating the images is difficult, he said.
In Bellows Falls, the petroglyphs project will allow for both archaeological study and cultural investigation.
According to Golec, the archeologist helping to lead the study, part of what makes the project unique is the leading role the Elnu will play in performing historical research and gathering relevant oral histories.
“We want to have the Indigenous perspective and the Indigenous people themselves in the forefront of this research,” she said.
Diana Jones, project coordinator and member of the Elnu Abenaki, said the work will lead to changes to the Bellows Falls Island listing in the National Registry of Historic Places, perhaps resulting in a separate listing for the petroglyphs.
Jones, who is a member of the Rockingham Planning Commission, explained that studying the petroglyphs fits into larger plans for collaboration between the town government and the Elnu.
A recently formed committee that includes the leaders of the petroglyph project has plans to open an Abenaki cultural center in an existing building near the Bellows Falls site, Jones said. The group has requested $10,000 in federal American Rescue Plan Act funding for the initiative.
And as Rockingham’s planning commision rewrites its town plan this year, it plans to add language explicitly supporting the local Indigenous community, whether through public educational programs, protecting important archeological sites, or maintaining a working relationship with the Elnu.
“I’ve lived here my whole life,” Jones said. “Let’s just say I wasn’t taught about the culture properly.”
“We’re only a state-recognized tribe. But getting federally recognized as an underrepresented community, even in the aspect of just a grant, is so important,” she added.
For the Odanak Abenaki in Canada, federal funding for Vermont’s Abeneki is worrisome.
Jacques Watso, an Odanak councilor, expressed concern that the Elnu would use the grant to support a “rewritten history” about the Abenaki in Vermont.
“They’ve been setting the narrative in Vermont. So we’re only just starting to speak up on our ancestral territories,” he said.
“Vermonters,” Watso added, should be able to question the state-recognized tribes “without fear of being called out as a racist just for asking questions.”
The Odanak Abenaki were not allowed to participate in the state recognition process, Watso said. The Vermont Abenaki have used the border between the U.S. and Canada — a colonial border — to thwart dialogue, he said.
Holschuh, the Elnu leader on the petroglyph project, highlighted a broader goal in learning about the Great Falls.
“Anyone who wants to participate is welcome. This is not an exclusive, proprietary endeavor,” he said.