Sequoyah’s Cabin Museum “PIC Heavy”

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

Today me Ash n Max loaded up and went down to Sallisaw for a BBQ lunch and then to Sequoyah’s cabin museum and park, 

I knew he had created the Cherokee syllabary so they would have a written language but I didn’t know he had fought In The the war of 1812, 

John had mentioned here on the forum that he was a blacksmith awhile back and that intrigued me to go visit his homestead

i Learned today that he was also a silversmith and an artist with paint

the cabin was built in 1829 by Sequoyah himself and the hand dug well was dug by him aswell over a spring and had sandstone stacked around it 

I learned that Sequoyah disappeared down in Mexico in search of another band of Cherokees an never returned home, 

his wife sold the homestead to the Blair family and they lived here up till the thirty’s an sold the place to the government and the WPA built a rock wall around the 10 acres and then built a rock building to permanently encase Sequoyah’s cabin for preservation, 

they built a few other things around the property like a stone and wood water tower that was fed by a windmill pump and gravity fed back down I thought that was kinda cool,

the two artifacts that are original to Sequoyah other then the cabin itself are the spinning wheel and the plow is what the tour guide said 

the visitors center and gift shop was built by the Blair family and they had built it off the side of Sequoyah’s cabin and plumbed into his original chimney in their add on that’s why there’s a random fireplace on the outside of the cabin, 

the WPA removed the Blair family’s add on since it was not part of the original structure 

anyways I might have missed some stuff but I made sure to take lots of pictures of all the plaques for anyone that wanted to read them, 

 

 

Here’s the second part with his cabin pictures 

[George N. M.]

Very cool, Billy.  Thank you.  Too bad they have not restored a blacksmith shop on the site.  I'm sure that this wasn't as cool for Max as the Santa Train but I hope he enjoyed parts of it.

GNM

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Thanks for the tour. Debi has a replica of Seqouyah's "Walking Wheel" that was made by a local craftsman named Troy Sisco. She has used it to spin wool and flax.

[Frosty]

Thanks Billy, I'll have to check out the second half later, I have to get moving, tonight is the first night of league curling and if they make me name a team I'm naming it after Thomas Powers. 

Sorry for the frivolous side track but I can't help it. Maybe if Deb and I get down your way we can talk you into a tour and some stories. 

Frosty The Lucky.

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

2 hours ago, George N. M. said:

Too bad they have not restored a blacksmith shop on the site.  I'm sure that this wasn't as cool for Max as the Santa Train but I hope he enjoyed parts of

your welcome George!

they said they will be building another cabin exhibit soon maybe a shop is opening n the works for the future?

don’t worry bout Max, he had ten acres of park to run around and he got a horse from the gift shop and last but not least there was a play area loaded with puzzles, coloring pages, crayons, activities ect.. at the cabin sorry I didn’t get a picture of that area, I’ll ask Ash if she did, 

anyways so it wasn’t completely boring for him! But you’re right he likes going to see dinosaurs and trains a lot more! lol

we saw a nice lookin restaurant on out way through Sallisaw and wouldn’t ya know there’s a small park across street with an old cabin and a caboose and some other stuff to see,

so we’re planning on running back down there another Saturday morning to grab lunch and let him go bezerk on the train car! Lol

2 hours ago, Irondragon ForgeClay Works said:

She has used it to spin wool and flax.

Your welcome Randy! I’m glad ya liked the tour!

they apparently host  different workshops through out the year with Cherokee demonstrators coming in and teaching different skills, ill try an let ya know when Incase y’all get board one day and don’t mind driving to Sallisaw! Lol

1 hour ago, Frosty said:

Thanks Billy, I'll have to check out the second half later

Your welcome Jerry,

the second half I already posted, I just split it up on that post with that comment,

 

[Scott NC]

  I enjoyed looking at all the pictures, thanks Billy.  I really liked reading about him creating the syllabary and teaching it to his daughter.  A lot of history I might never have learned.

[Frosty]

I'd only gotten to the half way mark by time I had to get ready to go curling. I Spent a leisurely hour or so going through the second half yesterday, your call caught me part way through that session. Thanks for the call, it's always good talking to you. Sequoyah was brilliant, a polymath in the truest sense of the word. It wouldn't surprise me a bit if he tried every craft that struck his fancy or appeared useful.

We learned about him in a superficial way in middle or high school, I don't recall which but it wasn't much more than a paragraph. He recognized the power of a written language, by definition the difference between "modern" and pre-historic civilizations destined to be lost to time. I'm going to have to do more reading about him. I'm into archeology and to an extent more modern history and Sequoyah is a fascinating character. From what I can see in your excellent photo tour his cabin may be small but the fit and finish on how it was built is top shelf. A fire place is not a good way to heat a home so keeping the building small is essential for comfort. The cooking utensils are typical "down hearth" utensils. I haven't shown Deb the wheel, I think she's used one in passing but has more time with drop spindles.

His desk is as good a lesson about what a person actually needs to do great things as I know of.  Like we tell newcomers to the blacksmith's craft so often, it isn't the tools it is the mind and hands of the blacksmith that works the iron.

Thank you for the video tour Billy, thank you very much.

Frosty The Lucky.

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

On 1/15/2023 at 3:51 AM, Scott NC said:

A lot of history I might never have learned.

Scott,

Heck I live 30 somethin minutes from there an I didn’t even know half that stuff! Lol

Jerry 

your very welcome! 

if y’all come down for a visit sometime I’ll make sure to take y’all down there!

[JHCC]

Still the only illiterate person to invent a written language.

[ThomasPowers]

Thanks for the pics of the spinning wheel!   Jo Ann tried to visit the cabin once but they were closed.

 

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

6 hours ago, JHCC said:

invent a written language.

John

He can’t be the only one? I mean someone who couldn’t read had to create all the other languages right? I dunno that’s one of those chicken before the egg type conversations! Lol

6 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

Thanks for the pics of the spinning wheel

your welcome Thomas!

if y’all make another trip out here this spring lemme know and I’ll call down there to get the open hour’s an days ahead of time!

[JHCC]

All other written languages evolved over time, sometimes thousands of years. Sequoyah was the only illiterate person to invent an entire writing system from nothing. 

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

Oh wow that’s pretty cool! 

the tour guide just said he had learned the power of the written word from his time in the military and that he had it in his mind to build something for the Cherokees to have a leg up,

I didn’t realize that he was the only one in history to do it from nothing though

[JHCC]

Yeah, it's an amazing story. It's impressive enough that he recognized the importance and practical utility of written language, but it's mind-boggling that he was able to analyze the Cherokee language and break it down into its eighty-some syllables, for each of which he then invented a unique character. One advantage of this system was that although it required memorization of a whole lot more characters than most alphabets (including the 26-character Latin alphabet used in English), anyone who spoke Cherokee could learn to read and write almost immediately on learning those characters. When it was introduced, linguist (and Founding Father) Abraham Gallatin praised its utility and noted that it would take English students two years to achieve the level of skill that a Cherokee student could achieve in a few weeks.

It's a credit to both Sequoyah and the Cherokee in general that within a few years of his introducing the completed syllabary (which took him a dozen years to develop), a majority of Cherokee had learned to read and write, at a time when only a third of English speakers were literate.

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

Yeah the nation has really been pushing for language learning and heritage stuff the last few years, 

they have opened a few emersion schools

im creek an Cherokee but I dont speak either language,

I use some of the tribes services occasionally but other then that I’m not really involved much with them,