When a final resting place erodes away, who is responsible for preserving human remains?

CATHY WURZER: You can find a lot of interesting stuff on the beaches of Lake Superior, mostly driftwood, rocks, and beach glass. Bones usually are not in the mix. So perhaps you heard about a young boy who discovered human remains last month, just down from the historic Glensheen Mansion in Duluth.

The big waves of the big lake have slowly eaten away the shoreline in that area, in parts of one of Duluth's oldest lakeside cemeteries. Well, it's been exposing some of the grave sites there. There's a larger issue of who's responsible, not only for the Scandia Cemetery, but the hundreds of other little used or abandoned cemeteries across the state.

Minnesota state archeologist Amanda "Gron-hoovd" is here. I'll try that again, Amanda-- Gronhovd is here. She's part of the team working on the next steps for the Scandia Cemetery. Amanda, thanks for taking the time.

AMANDA GRONHOVD: Hi, Cathy. How are you?

CATHY WURZER: I'm good, thank you. This is a lovely little bit of historic ground. What's the background of the cemetery? Who's buried there?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: Boy, lots of early, early inhabitants of Duluth. I think the cemetery was established in around 1881, I believe. And walking around in the cemetery, first, it's lovely. It's just beautiful. But a lot of those folks were born-- oh, gosh-- [LAUGHS] early 1800s. It's a beautiful little cemetery.

CATHY WURZER: It's unusual, isn't it, to have a cemetery along a lakeshore?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: Actually, not so much, you know? It's a gorgeous spot to sit and look out at the lake and a nice place to rest for eternity, right?

CATHY WURZER: So it should probably, then, maybe not come as a surprise that with the big waves that sometimes occur on Lake Superior, that the shoreline might be eroded. Have you seen just how bad it is up there?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: Yeah, yeah. The erosion is pretty significant. And especially with climate change and waves getting bigger, stronger, storms getting stronger, it's just going to continue. And the soils there, they're inclined to just sort of keep eroding. There's not a lot that's going to stop the eroding. There aren't the big rocks like there are in other areas.

CATHY WURZER: Mm-hmm. Just how many graves have been affected, do you know?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: I have no idea. I don't know how many. I don't know how far back the cemetery has-- I don't know how much land has already been lost.

CATHY WURZER: OK. So I'm wondering, can this be prevented? Is there a way to maybe shore up the shoreline?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: It certainly can be shored up. It would be a really big project and very, very expensive.

CATHY WURZER: And whose responsibility is this? I mean, Scambia Cemetery is not a very big cemetery, for goodness' sakes. Is this a city of Duluth situation, St. Louis County situation, some other organization?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: No, technically, it would be the Scandia Cemetery Association, whoever owns that property, to shore that up. And they're just a tiny little organization, and they certainly don't have the means to do it. So it really is going to be kind of a challenge.

The county has no legal obligation. The city has no legal obligation. I've been talking to the county, and we'll be talking to them more. I don't know that the county necessarily has the means to be able to stabilize the shoreline.

So I've been kind of trying to think of other options, other ways to get funding, other partners that would potentially be able to step up and assist with this. Other options would be to kind of go in and proactively remove the graves that are most at risk and move them back further into the cemetery.

That would be sort of a Band-Aid because the cemetery is going to continue to erode. But maybe that coupled with some sort of massive fundraising or grants or something like that would be options. I'm not sure, but I did try to do something.

CATHY WURZER: You know this. There are a lot of little historic cemeteries throughout the state. Some are abandoned or neglected, or they're out there in the hinterlands. Some are pretty tiny. Why is it important to preserve them? Why is it important to save something like the Scandia Cemetery?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: I think that it's a bunch of different things. Partly, it's just human dignity. When you're laid to rest, you have the right to stay there. We need to respect that for all humans.

That's part of the statute. The Minnesota Private Cemeteries Act says in its legislative intent that it is to protect and preserve the places that humans have been buried, and that that is sacred and that we need to protec those burials and those cemeteries and burial grounds, regardless of religion or whether they're Native American, or African-American, or Euro-American, or whomever they are.

And also, those are the folks that created our history. And we need to respect them for that. And so, it's an important part of our past. And I think it all really comes down to respect.

CATHY WURZER: But it also comes down to some money, too, right? So I'm wondering, because these are historic, sacred sites, do you suppose that there's, say, legacy amendment money that could be used to maybe shore up some of these little cemeteries?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: That is something that I've been thinking about. I am not part of the legacy grant process and have only peripherally been through it. And so that's something that I have been thinking about to bring up as part of this process. I don't think the legacy grants are nearly large enough to be able to actually shore up the shoreline in this area because, I mean, that would be millions of dollars to shore up the shoreline. But it could possibly help fund moving some of these graves back farther into the cemetery.

Some of these other smaller ones, like, say, along a lake or something for the Euro-American cemetery sites, that funding could potentially be used in those situations where there's smaller projects. My office doesn't have authority over American Indian cemetery sites. That's the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council. And usually, American Indian cemetery sites are not moved. They are preserved in place. And since that is not my wheelhouse, I'm not going to speak too much to that. But yeah, go ahead.

CATHY WURZER: Final question. Are these small cemeteries like the Scandia Cemetery, is this kind of a growing problem that you're seeing in terms of abandoned cemeteries or cemeteries running into issues like this at all? Or is this kind of an unusual situation?

AMANDA GRONHOVD: It's not unusual. The scale is unusual. I've got another similar situation in northern Minnesota. It's different in that this cemetery actually does have a cemetery association that maintains it. The one in northern Minnesota does not. It actually is an unplatted cemetery that never had an association. That cemetery is very early and was just never platted.

And so my office actually has authority over that cemetery. I'm just sort of a helper in this situation. But it's the scale that is quite unique with the Scandia Cemetery. The situations are usually much smaller and more manageable than this one.

CATHY WURZER: Interesting sets of questions it raises, though, Amanda. I appreciate your time. Thank you so much. And best of luck with this.

AMANDA GRONHOVD: Absolutely. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

CATHY WURZER: That was Amanda Gronhovd, Minnesota state archeologist.