Chota Memorial

"THE CHEROKEE CHIEFTAIN" by Peter Toth sits in front of the Museum Center at 5ive Points in downtown Cleveland. Beyond it is one of the painted wood "quilt blocks" which are part of the Appalachian Quilt Trail.

This day in Cherokee Nation History, on May 28, 1830, the Indian Removal Act was signed into law by President Andrew Jackson.

The act established a process authorizing the President to remove all Native Americans living within existing state borders and move them to unsettled land west of the Mississippi. The exchange would open up southeastern lands – that several Native American tribes called home, including the Cherokee – to white settlers.

The U.S. Senate passed the act by a vote of 28 to 19. The House of Representatives passed the act by a vote of 101 to 97.

Eight years later, the Cherokee would be forcibly removed by the U.S. government from southeastern ancestral homelands to what is now eastern Oklahoma.

(Information courtesy of Cherokee Nation History and Preservation)
(Photo courtesy: National Archives)

Today the largest deposit of seeds in The Svalbard Global Seed Vault will be deposited since it opened in 2008, with 36 seed banks storing samples on Tuesday, bringing the total number of seeds inside the vault to just over one million.

Among them is the Cherokee Nation, the first U.S.-based tribe to deposit seeds in the vault.

The tribe has selected nine seeds for the vault, including Cherokee white eagle corn, yellow flour corn, long greasy beans, Trail of Tears beans and candy roaster squash.

“It’s a great honor,” said Chuck Hoskin Jr., principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, of making the Svalbard seed deposit. “It says something about the strength and endurance of the Cherokee Nation. We’re talking about plants that predate European contact.”

Hannes Dempewolf, senior scientist at the Crop Trust, the international nonprofit that manages the seed vault together with the Norwegian Ministry of Agriculture and Food and the Nordic Genetic Resource Centre (NordGen) said very little is known about the cultural significance of many of the oldest seeds housed in seed banks, which is what makes the Cherokee Nation’s deposit particularly exciting for the Svalbard vault. “The Cherokee Nation have cherished a lot of the varieties that they’re depositing now for hundreds of years, if not millennia,” Dempewolf said, adding, “There’s so much cultural history and story connected to those seeds.”

How This Frozen Mountain Vault Could Save Us From A Global Food Crisis The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is welcoming new seeds from around the world, including the Cherokee Nation.

Cherokees become the first US-based tribe to deposit traditional heirloom seeds in the Arctic vault No Native American tribe has ever received an invitation to store its traditional heirloom seeds in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault.

U.S. Mint to honor Sequoyah on Native American $1 coin Sequoyah’s contribution to the Cherokee people also gave birth to Native American journalism.

Bill to place lands in Tennessee into trust passes House - The Cherokee One Feather The House of Representatives has passed legislation that would put 76 acres in east Tennessee, containing several historic sites to the Tribe, into trust for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.

Bill aiming to return historic Cherokee land passes House, heads to Senate A U.S. House bill aimed at keeping a promise made decades ago to the Cherokee people now has passed out of that chamber and is headed to the U.S. Senate.