Museum and Signage
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Cherokee Village
Traditional Cherokee homes were located in villages with members sharing in a communal lifestyle based on agriculture, hunting and gathering. Homes were made of wattle and daub, a clay-covered patchwork of interwoven limbs and branches.
Anetsa
The Cherokee played a variety of games, including the Cherokee stickball or anetsa. A game with many rituals and ceremonies, it was an important part of the Cherokee culture and was often played by large crowds from opposing towns and clans. The objective was to score by throwing a small ball through a goal at the end of a large playing field. The first team to score 12 times was the winner.
Wolftown Ball Team - Cherokee, North Carolina 1888
The Cherokee played a variety of games, including the Cherokee stickball or anetsa. A game with many rituals and ceremonies, it was an important part of the Cherokee culture and was often played by large crowds from opposing towns and clans. The objective was to score by throwing a small ball through a goal at the end of a large playing field. The first team to score 12 times was the winner.
Ball Field
The Cherokee played a variety of games, including the Cherokee stickball or anetsa. A game with many rituals and ceremonies, it was an important part of the Cherokee culture and was often played by large crowds from opposing towns and clans. The objective was to score by throwing a small ball through a goal at the end of a large playing field. The first team to score 12 times was the winner.
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Anetsa
The Cherokee played a variety of games, including the Cherokee stickball or anetsa. A game with many rituals and ceremonies, it was an important part of the Cherokee culture and was often played by large crowds from opposing towns and clans. The objective was to score by throwing a small ball through a goal at the end of a large playing field. The first team to score 12 times was the winner.
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Tools
Flint, bone, clay and other materials from the forest and rivers provided resources for everyday tools such as knives, scrapers, pottery, hammers, needles and stone axes.
cherokeegeorgiahistorical sitenative americannew echotatools
Points
Many "point" type artifacts referred to as "arrowheads" are actually spear points and pieces of hide scrapers, knives and other tools.
cherokeegeorgiahistorical sitenative americannew echotatools
John Walker Candy House
Candy was a Cherokee who moved to New Echota to work as a printer and translator at the Cherokee Phoenix printing office. He married Mary Ann Watie, who was a sister of Elias Boudinot. After they moved from New Echota, their vacant house was used by Sophia Sawyer as a school.
Elijah Hicks House
Elijah Hicks, his wife Margaret, and their seven children lived in a large two-story frame house. Hicks was active in the Cherokee government, served as editor of the Cherokee Phoenix from 1832 - 1834, and led one of the detachments on the Trail of Tears.
John A. Bell / Joseph M. Lynch House
Historical documents list them owning, in partnership, a dwelling house and two stables at New Echota. Bell and Lynch were both prosperous Cherokee farmers and businessmen. Since neither lived here they may have used their New Echota house as rental property.
Alexander McCoy House
Alexander McCoy, his wife Sarah, and their eight children lived in a large two-story "dogtrot" style log house. McCoy was active in the Cherokee government and was also a successful businessman who operated the New Echota ferry.
McCoy's Stable
An unusual set of stables sixty feet long stood near the McCoy house. McCoy rented rooms to travelers in his home and needed the large stables for their horses.
Daniel McCoy's Store
At least four stores were constructed at New Echota. McCoy's store operated all year while the others usually operated during council meetings. McCoy was a prominent Cherokee who served as a justice on the Cherokee Supreme Court. His New Echota store was built of hewn logs and featured a plank floor, counters, and shelves.
John F. Wheeler House
Wheeler was a white man from Kentucky who moved to New Echota in 1827 to work as a printer in the Cherokee Phoenix printing office. In 1829 he married Nancy Watie who was a sister of Elias Boudinot. Their house was described as a "handsome cottage".
Brigadier General John E. Wool
Brigadier General John E. Wool. Commander of Cherokee removal operations 1836 - 1837.
Major General Winfield Scott
Major General Winfield Scott. Commander of Cherokee removal operations 1837 - 1838.
Boat Travel
Traveling on keelboats puled by steamboats, the first three detachments of Cherokees totaling about 2,800 persons left in early June, 1838 from Ross's Landing. They traveled via the Tennessee, Ohio, Mississippi and Arkansas Rivers. Terrible conditions on the boats caused much illness leading to many deaths.
Reverend Stephen Foreman
Cherokee Ministers Stephen Foreman and Jessie Bushyhead led detachments on the Trail of Tears. Both of their detachments were delayed in southern Illinois because of ice on the Mississippi River. Both Foreman's and Bushyhead's wives would have children born while on the Trail of Tears, two of the seventy-five births recorded along the trail.
Reverend Jesse Bushyhead
Cherokee Ministers Stephen Foreman and Jessie Bushyhead led detachments on the Trail of Tears. Both of their detachments were delayed in southern Illinois because of ice on the Mississippi River. Both Foreman's and Bushyhead's wives would have children born while on the Trail of Tears, two of the seventy-five births recorded along the trail.
Eliza Missouri Bushyhead
Eliza Missouri Bushyhead was born on the Trail of Tears.
Elizur Butler
Elizur Butler, Protestant missionary and medical doctor, was arrested with Samuel Wocester in the early 1830s for violating Georgia's new laws. He would continue to work with the Cherokee for years after the removal west.
"All of the suffering and all the difficulties of the Cherokee people were charged to the accounts of Ridge and Boudinot." - Aug. 2, 1838
"From the first of June I have felt I have been in the midst of death." - Jan. 1839
Quatie Ross, wife of Chief John Ross
Those Cherokees traveling by boat were not protected from the miseries suffered suffered by those traveling overland. Near the end of the Ross' trip by boat, Quatie became ill with pneumonia and died in February 1839 in Little Rock, Arkansas.
