Huron Cemetery

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Huron Cemetery
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. National Historic Landmark
The entrance sign
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Location	Kansas City, Kansas
Coordinates	39°6′53.04″N 94°37′33.68″W / 39.1147333°N 94.6260222°W / 39.1147333; -94.6260222
Area	2.5 acres (1.0 ha)
Built	1843; 181 years ago (1843)
NRHP reference No.	71000335[1]
Significant dates
Added to NRHP	September 3, 1971
Designated NHL	December 23, 2016

The Huron Indian Cemetery in Kansas City, Kansas, also known as Huron Park Cemetery, is now formally known as the Wyandot National Burying Ground. It was established c. 1843, soon after the Wyandot (called Huron by French explorers) had arrived following removal from Ohio. The tribe settled in the area for years, with many in 1855 accepting allotment of lands in Kansas in severalty. The majority of the Wyandot removed to Oklahoma in 1867, where they maintained tribal institutions and communal property. As a federally recognized tribe, they had legal control over the communal property of Huron Cemetery. For more than 100 years, the property has been controversial between the federally recognized Wyandotte Nation, based in Oklahoma, which wanted to sell it for redevelopment, and the much smaller, unrecognized Wyandot Nation of Kansas, which wanted to preserve the burying ground.

The cemetery is located at North 7th Street Trafficway and Minnesota Avenue in Kansas City. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 3, 1971, and has been formally renamed the Wyandot National Burying Ground. It is in the Kansas City, Kansas Historic District. It was placed on the Register of Historic Kansas Places on July 1, 1977.

In the early 20th century, Lyda Conley and her two sisters in Kansas City, Kansas led a years-long battle to preserve the cemetery against forces wanting to develop it. In 1916 the cemetery gained some protection as a national park under legislation supported by Kansas Senator Charles Curtis. It continued to be subject to development pressure, with new proposals coming up about every decade. Passage of the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act provided new protections, as lineal descendants of those interred must be consulted and they have a voice in disposition of cemeteries and gravesites. Lineal descendants among the Wyandot Nation of Kansas have strongly supported continued preservation of the cemetery in its original use.

In 1998, the Wyandotte Nation and Wyandot Nation of Kansas signed an agreement to use the Huron Cemetery only for religious, cultural or other activities compatible with use of the site as a burial ground.^[2] In December 2016 the cemetery was named as a National Historic Landmark.^[3]