The legislature of Oklahoma determined in 1911, that one of their statues to be placed in the National Statuary Hall Collection would be a statue of Sequoyah.
Little is known about Sequoyah that can be backed up with primary material, but I will share some of what I have found. It is believed Sequoyah was born in 1760. His mother was Cherokee. It seems his father left before he was born. Some accounts say his father was a Dutch, or German peddler named Gist.
Sequoyah’s mother owned a trading post, which he took over and ran after her death. For a time Sequoyah sold alcohol at his trading post and for a period of time was known as a drunkard. As he saw his life spin out of control he decided the alcohol was to blame, and he stopped drinking. He also stopped selling liquor at his trading post and actively tried to discourage others from drinking.
Sequoyah found new interests which he felt would help him quit alcohol. It worked. Sequoyah taught himself blacksmithing. He also became interested in working silver and learned the skills needed to be a silversmith.
In 1809, Sequoyah became fascinated with the ability to send messages using marks on paper. He saw the white men do this, and decided he could design a Cherokee alphabet. At first he had a problem because his alphabet was too large. The Cherokee language had too many individual sounds. Sequoyah solved this problem by coming up with a syllabary. It contained 84 characters. Each stood for a syllable rather than one sound.
At first many mocked him. Some even accused him of using sorcery. But as more and more were taught his method of capturing the Cherokee language on paper, and saw that it worked, the ridicule subsided. Sequoyah’s accomplishment was recognized and praised.
Sequoyah then joined a delegation to negotiate land treaties in Washington DC. There, he met other Native American tribal representatives and decided to create a syllabary that would work for other native languages.
Diana Erbio is a freelance writer and author of “Coming to America: A Girl Struggles to Find her Way in a New World”. Read more in her series Statues: The People They Salute visit The Table of Contents and the Facebook Page. (I’ll be adding to the Substack Table of Contents as I transfer the Blog Posts. Please subscribe to this Substack 😊🇺🇸🤓)
Interesting Account of Sequoyah.
Definitely something new to me.