When was sequoyah born and died

Throughout his life, Sequoyah remained faithful to the traditions of the Cherokee people, never adopting white dress, religion, or other customs. He spoke Cherokee exclusively. In the s, Sequoyah resettled in what is now Arkansas when tribal land along the Tennessee River was ceded to whites. He worked for many years as a trader and later became a silversmith as well as a blacksmith.

Once the Cherokee officially adopted his syllabary, a large part of the Nation achieved literacy in a very short time. Following the adoption of his syllabary by the Cherokee, Sequoyah continued to work for the benefit of his people, traveling to Washington, D.

Dedicated to uniting the scattered Cherokee Nation, he died around traveling in Texas and Mexico attempting to locate communities of Cherokee believed to be living in that area. Oklahoma City: Oklahoma Historical Society, Klausner, Janet. New York: Harper-Collins, Shumate, Jane. Sequoyah: Inventor of the Cherokee Alphabet. New York: Chelsea House, Toggle navigation. Early life Sequoyah was born at the Cherokee village of Taskigi in Tennessee.

Sees need for written communication A hunter and fur trader until a crippling hunting accident, Sequoyah became an excellent silversmith maker of products containing silver. Helps spread knowledge In Sequoyah went to Arkansas to teach his alphabet to the Cherokee who already had moved westward, and he moved with them to Oklahoma in Also read article about Sequoyah from Wikipedia.

User Contributions:. Comment about this article, ask questions, or add new information about this topic: Name:. E-mail: Show my email publicly. Human Verification:. Public Comment: characters. Inventor of the Cherokee syllabary, Sequoyah, also known as George Guess or Gist, was probably born in the late s at Tuskegee, which now lies under Tellico Lake in Tennessee.

Although his paternity is debated he may have been the son of Nathaniel Gist, a Virginia soldier at Fort Loudoun, or of George Gist, a Dutch peddler he was probably the son of the former. The year after he was discharged, he married Sally Waters, a mixed-blood Cherokee. In he signed a treaty exchanging Cherokee land in the southeast for an area in Arkansas. Although Sequoyah agreed to move west, he recanted in He still lost his home, however, and moved to Willstown Fort Payne , Alabama.

Having noted that white men could convey their thoughts through "talking leaves," Sequoyah believed he could devise a similar method for the Cherokee.

Although he may have had the idea earlier, Sequoyah probably began his work at Willstown. He first attempted to make a symbol for every word but found that cumbersome.