The Cherokee Indians first lived in Tennessee. The name Indian first came from Christopher Columbus, who thought that America was part of the Indies, Asia. The first person to come across Indians was Hernando de Soto, in 1540.
             In wintertime the Indian men wore long sleeved shirts, loose –fitting leggings, and moosehide moccasins. Women wore skin dresses tied at the waist and long, fitted leggings.
             Indians would hunt deer, elk, moose and buffalo. They would also eat rabbits, raccoons and birds. The women would sometimes make a stew with the meat. They also ate berries, nuts, fruit and beans and corn.
             Indian houses were made of stone, wood, skins, twigs and mud. There were wigwams; tipis, earth and grass covered houses. The tipis were made of buffalo skins. The tipi would protect the Indians from the cold winters. They always faced the tipi towards the east because the winds came from the west.
             The Indian children liked to have toys, their fathers and grandfathers would make small bows and arrows, sling shots and bean shooters. The girls liked to string berries to make a necklace; they made dolls out of grass, pine needles and bark. The boys would practice target shooting when they were old enough to prepare for when they would hunt.
             The Indians worshipped the sun, the wind and the rain. They celebrated places on earth that were important to the Indian people, such as a mountain, a lake or a valley. The Indians believed animals including birds were also people, just like the tribes.
             Indians knew a great deal about nature, they believed that a job was well done only when the spirits had been thanked. They had dances and festivals to help make their crops grow.
             Sequoyah was a great Cherokee Indian. Sequoyah was born in 1776 at a village called Tuskeegee. He was the first man to create a writing system for the Cherokees. Sequoyah never learned the English alphabet so he began to make up symbols th...