KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Find them. Name them. Return them. Honor them.
That's the plea from Native Americans on Orange Shirt Day, which remembers the thousands of Native children killed at church-run residential schools.
Thursday, Shawnee Chief Ben Barnes called for a federal investigation into Native American residential schools in America.
He says his tribe survived the Shawnee Indian Mission Boarding School — and he's working with Kansas leaders to create a healing path forward.
"My people may not be some of the largest tribes in America, and we may not be the wealthiest," Barnes said. "But we still have our culture, our tradition, our religion and our language. And it's because of what our people survived here."
Barnes hopes the federal government partners with them to investigate these schools and find the remains of the children killed.
