With House Razed, Shinnecock Graves Protection Warrior Society Turns Attention To Restoring Sugar Loaf

Last month, when a sprawling 7,000-square-foot house on the top of Sugar Loaf in Shinnecock Hills was razed and the second of two ground-penetrating radar studies of the site was completed, members of the Shinnecock Graves Protection Warrior Society said it was plain as day, as they have said for years, that tribal burials had taken place on the summit of the hill, with its broad views of Shinnecock Bay and the Atlantic Ocean beyond.

“When we first got the hill under our control, we were worried it was completely desecrated,” said Shane Weeks, the co-chairman of the Graves Protection Warrior Society, of the area the tribe says is its most sacred burial ground. “But there are still significant sites on the hilltop — so it’s not just our word we have to go on now. We can now prove what we have been saying all along is the case.”

The society is dedicated to protecting the tribe’s burial grounds and repatriating the remains of Shinnecock ancestors from museums, universities, and the private collections that acquired them from the archeologists, who, they say, looted the sites under the pretext of conducting studies.

A year ago, after lengthy negotiations, Southampton Town agreed to spend $5.3 million to buy the development rights to the 4.5-acre parcel at 536 Montauk Highway, where the Nappa family had built their vacation home in 1990. The house has since been torn down.

The tribe, working in partnership with the Peconic Land Trust, which acquired the land itself as part of the deal, has been seeking to restore the property to its native state so that the graves — some of which could have been bulldozed away, buried under the house’s foundation or plundered when archeologists conducted studies of the area in the 1930s and 1950s — could be protected from further desecration.

The society, which has already repatriated more than 100 sets of remains from the Southold Indian Museum and the Museum of Natural History in New York, plans to repatriate another 14 from the New York State Museum in Albany as soon as it is practicable to do so, Weeks said.

But in the meantime, it is necessary to come up with a plan for the preservation of Sugar Loaf, where Weeks said some of the graves could date to 2500 BC, though many are more recent.

The town undertook an initial ground-penetrating radar study in August 2021 shortly after the sale closed. The initial study showed signs of what is believed to have been a crematory and a number of apparent graves at the site. A second study was conducted in April after the house was torn down, but the report has not yet been completed.

Any plan at the site would include the replanting of some of the native plants to protect the watershed, said Tela Troge, the tribal attorney and a member of the society. “We can celebrate the environmental victory, at least,” she said, “but there is a lot of work to be done on many levels.”

“We aren’t doing this for ourselves or for money,” added Rebecca Genia, the society’s co-chair. “We’re doing it because the Earth can’t take it any longer. We are doing this because our ancestors have given us this mission. Graves protection is one way to preserve what’s left.”

While Genia said it was “miraculous” that Sugar Loaf had been purchased and is being restored, she said she remains bitter over what she says is Southampton Town’s failure to recognize the urgent need to protect still more land in the Shinnecock Hills area that likely contains more ancient graves.

Genia said she understands that the town’s Community Preservation Fund relies on a willing seller before it can buy a property, but she said she believes the town makes low-ball offers and doesn’t follow through on opportunities to close deals. “It’s so easy for them to shrug their shoulders and say, ‘We tried,’” she said. “They love to sugarcoat their side of the story.”

But Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman insists Genia is mistaken. “It’s been the town’s No. 1 priority for CPF acquisitions,” he said of Shinnecock Hills, “above water quality, above woodlands, above habitat protection.”

He said in the two-plus decades the CPF has existed, the town has acquired about two dozen parcels in the area. “A lot of it has been below the radar,” he said. “The more attention on a parcel, the higher the price.”

One property Genia has targeted is 501 Montauk Highway, just across the road from Sugar Loaf. Over the past year, she has led intermittent protests, as some of the property has been cleared, as if in preparation for construction to begin.

According to town records, the 1.3-acre parcel is owned by Vassilia and Peter Calogrias. Peter Calogrias is an owner of Callos Builders, a high-end residential construction company.

Town Attorney James Burke said a stop-work order had been filed last month when fill was brought to the site, but it was later lifted when the town determined the owners were operating within their rights.

Schneiderman said the town has made offers to buy the property, but it has not yet been able to strike a deal. Calogrias could not be reached for comment.

“When Hawthorne Road happened, I thought for sure the whole Town of Southampton would wake up,” Genia said, referring to the unearthing of skeletal remains during excavation work for the construction of a new house at a site not far from Sugar Loaf.

“We literally had a skull rolling down the hill after another house was approved in the hills,” she said.

The town eventually bought the property, but the tribe had to come up with a portion of the price. “We had to beg them to act,” Genia said. “We almost lost Hawthorne because of $50,000.”

“I think there is a lot more education that needs to be done. There is a lot of relationship building that needs to be done,” said Troge. “The Shinnecock, community members and the Town Board need to find a way to sit down and talk to each other and figure it out.”

She said even though the summit of Sugar Loaf has been preserved, there are still many parts of Shinnecock Hills that contain sensitive parcels, among them the 501 Montauk Highway parcel and property on Montauk Highway owned by the Spellman family, closer to Hampton Bays, that could be subdivided into as many as four lots.

“We have done a walk-through of the site, and we believe with a high level of confidence that there were burials there,” she said. “We are looking to work with the town to use CPF to purchase it.”

Still, Troge said it was important to recognize that the tribe and town had already accomplished much together. “We have started the conversation, started the relationship building, and started to figure out how to work together to accomplish shared goals and objectives,” she said.

One of those goals was the passage in 2020 of town graves protection legislation. Now, a bill that would provide similar protections on a statewide basis is making its way through the State Legislature.

The bill was recently approved by the State Senate, and on Monday, Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. said he was confident the bill would pass the Assembly and be sent to Governor Kathy Hochul for her signature. He cautioned, though, that the measure has been opposed by the construction industry, so her signature was not a guarantee.

Weeks said the tribe was focused on what it could do, independently of the state or town.

“These ancestors are speaking to us, because they want to come home,” he said.