Verne F. Ray Ph.D.

Verne F. RAY, Ph.D Verne F. Ray, retired professor of anthropology at the University of Washington, and pioneer ethnographer of many Pacific Northwest Indian tribes, died on 28 September in Port Townsend, Washington, at the age of 98. After retirement in 1966 he served as an expert witness and consultant for 53 Indian land claims cases. Dr. Ray was born on March 13, 1905 in Enfield, Illinois to Della Duncan and Arden Ray, but came to the state of Washington as an infant. He graduated from Franklin High School in Seattle, and received his B.A. and M.A. in anthropology from the University of Washington, and his Ph.D, from Yale University in 1937. As one of the first anthropologists at the University of Washington, he was appointed "Assistant in Anthropology, Washington State Museum" in 1930. During his tenure as a Professor he also served as head of the Anthropology Department and as Associate Dean, but since the University did not have enough money at that time for the position of Dean, he was appointed as Associate Dean. In the 1930's he was Director of the Emergency Conservation Program, U.S. Department of the Interior, on the Colville and Spokane Indian Reservations. On a leave of absence from the University from 1951 to 1954 he was Research Director of the Human Relations Area Files in New Haven, Connecticut. His anthropological interests were varied, ranging from theory and methodology to field research in the Middle East, the Valley of Mexico, and in all of the Indian tribes of the Pacific Northwest and northern California. His professional papers and books in the 1930's and 1940's were models of research for the many Indian land claims resulting from the passage of the Indian Claims Commission Act in 1946. Dr. Ray represented 44 tribes in 53 cases before the Claims Commission and other courts, winning millions of dollars for the tribes for the wrongful taking of their lands by the United States government. For the Cowlitz, it gained them recognition as a tribe by the federal government. For this achievement, the Cowlitz Tribal Council voted him an honorary member in 2000. He had many other interests, especially sailing and the building and remodeling of boats and houses. Having been rejected by the military because of health problems during World War II, he joined the Coast Guard Auxiliary, and consequently became well acquainted with Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and finally, Port Townsend, where between 1965 and 1970 he restored a four-apartment building to its single-family state of 1884 without any help. He was a life member of the Seattle Yacht Club. He was preceded in death by his daughter, La Verne Ray Fromberg and son-in-law, Gerald Fromberg. He is survived by his wife of 48 years, Dorothy Jean Ray of Port Townsend; stepson, Eric S. Thompson of Anchorage, Alaska; three grandsons, Paul Fromberg and Robert Fromberg of Evanston and Oak Park, Illinois, Steven Fromberg of Chapl Hill, North Carolina, and two great grandsons.