Way Of Life

Way of Life

Many Native Indians who used the forest for
food, shelter, clothing, weapons, and tools.
All of these came from the forests around them.
These include the Iroquois, Cherokee, and Cahokia Indians.
They depended on the natural resources
around them for all of their basic needs.
Because these Indians lived in the forests,
they were called the Eastern Woodland Indians.
They lived in villages near a lake or stream.
The Woodland Indians lived in wigwams and long houses.
The Iroquois, Cherokee’s and Mound Builders
were important Woodland tribes.

The Cherokee lived mainly in what are
now Tennessee and Georgia.
Like the Iroquois, the Cherokee depended
on their natural resources for survival.
They lived in about 200 fairly large villages.
A normal Cherokee town had anywhere from 30 to 60
houses and a large meeting building.
Cherokee homes were usually wattle and daub.
Wattle is twigs, branches, and stalks woven
together to make a frame for a building.
Daub is a sticky substance like mud or clay.
The Cherokee covered the wattle frame with daub.
This created a look of an upside down basket.
Later, log cabins with bark roofs were used
for homes by the Iroquois and Cherokee.
The Cherokee villages also had fences all
around them to prevent enemies from entering
the villages.

Like the Iroquois, the Cherokee also hunted
small game such as:
deer, rabbit, and bear.
Since their villages were usually near streams or lakes,
they fished using spears and nets for food also.
Berries, nuts, and wild plants were important
forms of food for the Cherokee.
The Cherokee were considered to be excellent farmers.
They had large farms that they grew:
corns, beans, and squash.

The Cherokee women wore skirts woven from plants.
The men wore breechcloths or leggings.
The men would paint their skin and decorate it.
The women would sew feathers into
light capes made of netting.

The Cherokee were considered one of
the most "civilized" tribes
of North America.
They had their own laws, courts, and schools.
A Cherokee Indian named Sequoyah
invented a written language called:
"Talking Leaves".
It had 86 characters.
Within a few years all of the
Woodland Cherokees could read and write it.

Between 1790 and 1830 the white man began
to push westward into the Cherokee territory.
The Cherokee fought hard to keep their land.
They even fought against being removed
from their land.
At first it looked as if they might win.
But they were forced to leave the
land they loved and had work to take care of.
In one of the saddest and most heartless stories in our history,
thousands of men, women,
and children were forced off of the land
they loved and moved into forts that
were to small with very little food.
They were then forced to walk over
a thousand miles to what is now Arkansas.
It was an unusually cold winter.
This walk should not have ever happened,
but it did.
Many of the Indians were barefoot
with little clothing.
They were forced to walk through snow and ice.
They ate only what they could find along the way.
Many Indians died along the way,
especially older Indians and children.
Their bloody footprints left trails of blood
in the snow as they walk on.
They cried as they went because they were leaving
the land they loved,
The land they had called home for so many many years.
This horribly long, sad journey of the Cherokee
has become known in history as:
"The Trail of Tears".
It is one that all should get and read.
4/24/2000


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