Cherokee Quotes

Early in the 1990s, I flew alone in a dandelion-yellow, single-engine, 180-horsepower Piper Cherokee from Westchester County Airport in New York westward to the Rocky Mountains, landing and refuelling a good many times in middle-sized cities and towns along the way. ~ Cynthia Ozick

Prior to my election, young Cherokee girls would never have thought that they might grow up and become chief. ~ Wilma Mankiller

A flower is your cousin ... Sometimes a person has got to take a life, like a chicken's or a hog's when you need it ... But nobody is so hungry they need to kill a flower. Cherokee great-grandmother ~ Barbara Kingsolver

A significant number of people believe tribal people still live and dress as they did 300 years ago. During my tenure as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, national news agencies requesting interviews sometimes asked if they could film a tribal dance or if I would wear traditional tribal clothing for the interview. I doubt they asked the president of the United States to dress like a pilgrim for an interview. ~ Wilma Mankiller

{Excerpt from a message from one of the Cherokee chiefs - Onitositaii, commonly known as Old Tassle}

... 'If, therefore, a bare march, or reconnoitering a country is sufficient reason to ground a claim to it, we shall insist upon transposing the demand, and your relinquishing your settlements on the western waters and removing one hundred miles back towards the east, whither some of our warriors advanced against you in the course of last year's campaign.

Let us examine the facts of your present eruption into our country, and we shall discover your pretentions on that ground. What did you do? You marched into our territories with a superior force; our vigilance gave us no timely notice of your manouvres [sic]; your numbers far exceeded us, and we fled to the stronghold of our extensive woods, there to secure our women and children.

Thus, you marched into our towns; they were left to your mercy; you killed a few scattered and defenseless individuals, spread fire and desolation wherever you pleased, and returned again to your own habitations. If you meant this, indeed, as a conquest you omitted the most essential point; you should have fortified the junction of the Holstein and Tennessee rivers, and have thereby conquered all the waters above you. But, as all are fair advantages during the existence of a state of war, it is now too late for us to suffer for your mishap of generalship!

Again, were we to inquire by what law or authority ~ John Ehle

Let's have some precision in language here: terrorism means deadly violence -- for a political and/or economical purpose -- carried out against people and other living things, and is usually conducted by governments against their own citizens (as at Kent State, or in Vietnam, or in Poland, or in most of Latin America right now), or by corporate entities such as J. Paul Getty, Exxon, Mobil Oil, etc etc., against the land and all creatures that depend upon the land for life and livelihood. A bulldozer ripping up a hillside to strip mine for coal is committing terrorism; the damnation of a flowing river followed by the drowning of Cherokee graves, of forest and farmland, is an act of terrorism.
Sabotage, on the other hand, means the use of force against inanimate property, such as machinery, which is being used (e.g.) to deprive human beings of their rightful work (as in the case of Ned Ludd and his mates); sabotage (le sabot dropped in a spinning jenny) -- for whatever purpose -- has never meant and has never implied the use of violence against living creatures. ~ Edward Abbey

I'm Cherokee, and there were times when social expansion was something that is needed by a cultural group or a national group. ~ Wes Studi

It was like staring into the face of a familiar stranger. You know, that person you see in a crowd and swear you know, but you really don't? Now she was me - the familiar stranger.

She had my eyes. They were the same hazel color that could never decide whether it wanted to be green or brown, but my eyes had never been that big and round. Or had they? She had my hair - long and straight and almost as dark as my grandma's had been before hers had begun to turn silver. The stranger had my high cheekbones, long, strong nose, and wide mouth - more features from my grandma and her Cherokee ancestors. But my face had never been that pale. I'd always been olive-ish, much darker skinned than anyone else in my family. But maybe it wasn't that my skin was suddenly so white ... maybe it just looked pale in comparison to the dark blue outline of the crescent moon that was perfectly positioned in the middle of my forehead. Or maybe it was the horrid fluorescent lighting. I hoped it was the lighting.

I stared at the exotic-looking tattoo. Mixed with my strong Cherokee features it seemed to brand me with a mark of wildness ... as if I belonged to ancient times when the world was bigger ... more barbaric.

From this day on my life would never be the same. And for a moment - just an instant - I forgot about the horror of not belonging and felt a shocking burst of pleasure, while deep inside of me the blood of my grandmother's people rejoiced. ~ P.C. Cast

Weetzie and My Secret Agent Lover Man and Dirk and Duck and Cherokee and Witch Baby and Slinkster Dog and Go-Go Girl and the puppies Pee Wee, Wee Wee, Teenie Wee, Tiki Tee, and Tee Pee were driving down Hollywood Boulevard on their way to the Tick Tock Tea Room for turkey platters. ~ Francesca Lia Block

Negative thoughts were treated by Cherokee healers with the same medicines as wounds, headaches, or physical illness. It was believed that unchecked negative thoughts can permeate the being and manifest themselves in negative actions. ~ Wilma Mankiller

All right," I said, waving the cup away and dabbing moisture very carefully from my lips. "I'm fine." I breathed shallowly, feeling my heart begin to slow down. "Well. So. At least now I know why you've been coming back from the Cherokee villages in such a state of-- off--" I felt an unhinged giggle rising, and bent over, moaning as I stifled it. "Oh, Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ. And here I thought it was thoughts of me, driving you mad with lust."
He snorted then himself, though mildly. He put down the cup, rose, and turned back the coverlet. Then he looked at me, and his eyes were clear, unguarded.
"Claire," he said, quite gently, "it was you. It's always been you, and it always will be. Get into bed, and put the candle out. As soon as I've fastened the shutters, smoored the hearth, and barred the door, I'll come and keep ye warm. ~ Diana Gabaldon

When a new kind of 'race trouble' broke out in 1912, Forsyth was a place that had already witnessed the rapid expulsion of an entire people, and many residents, like Charlie Harris, had heard firsthand accounts from relatives who'd taken part in the Cherokee removals. So whenever someone first suggested that blacks in the county should not only be punished for the murder of Mae Crow but driven out of the county forever, the white people of Forsyth knew in their bones that such a thing was possible. After all, many families owed their land and their livelihoods to exactly such a racial cleansing in the 1830s. ~ Patrick Phillips

Your father doesn't like me," Charley said to Wesley later when Wesley had gotten them away from the crowd.
"Father doesn't seem to like anyone," Wesley said. "Don't let it worry you."
"But you brought me to his house. I don't like to be in the home of someone who doesn't like me."
"But my brother Skylar claims it is his home, and I believe that Skylar does like you," Wesley said. "He's Indian like you."
"Yes. We are both Cherokees. What is Skylar's clan?"
"I believe I've heard him say that it's Wolf."
"Then we are related. I'm Wolf clan."
"That's amazing, Charley. So you and my brother are related. Does that make us related too?"
"I don't think so, Wesley, because the relationship is through our mothers."
"Well, that's too bad. I would like to be your brother. ~ Robert J. Conley

I'm lucky because I have so many clashing cultural, racial things going on: black, Jewish, Irish, Portuguese, Cherokee. I can float and be part of any community I want. ~ Rashida Jones

We recall that to the Cherokee, as to other people who have noticed how long it sometimes takes for humans to develop fully, adulthood comes
if it is coming at all
at the age of fifty-two. ~ Alice Walker

Plantation justice was mean and constant but the world was indiscriminate. Out in the world, the wicked escaped comeuppance and the decent stood in their stead at the whipping tree. Tennessee's disasters were the fruit of indifferent nature, without connection to the crimes of the homesteaders. To how the Cherokee had lived their lives. ~ Colson Whitehead

Grant Foreman, the leading authority on Indian removal, estimates that during confinement in the stockade or on the march westward four thousand Cherokees died. In December 1838, President Van Buren spoke to Congress: It affords sincere pleasure to apprise the Congress of the entire removal of the Cherokee Nation of Indians to their new homes west of the Mississippi. The measures authorized by Congress at its last session have had the happiest effects. ~ Howard Zinn

Looking back, one can almost imagine them stalking through the wild with specimen bottles and outsize nets, in determined pursuit of the Ojibwa adverb or the Cherokee pronoun. ~ Margalit Fox

Since this often seems to come up in discussions of the radical style, I'll mention one other gleaning from my voyages. Beware of Identity politics. I'll rephrase that: have nothing to do with identity politics. I remember very well the first time I heard the saying "The Personal Is Political." It began as a sort of reaction to defeats and downturns that followed 1968: a consolation prize, as you might say, for people who had missed that year. I knew in my bones that a truly Bad Idea had entered the discourse. Nor was I wrong. People began to stand up at meetings and orate about how they 'felt', not about what or how they thought, and about who they were rather than what (if anything) they had done or stood for. It became the replication in even less interesting form of the narcissism of the small difference, because each identity group begat its sub-groups and "specificities." This tendency has often been satirised - the overweight caucus of the Cherokee transgender disabled lesbian faction demands a hearing on its needs - but never satirised enough. You have to have seen it really happen. From a way of being radical it very swiftly became a way of being reactionary; the Clarence Thomas hearings demonstrated this to all but the most dense and boring and selfish, but then, it was the dense and boring and selfish who had always seen identity politics as their big chance.
Anyway, what you swiftly realise if you peek over the wall of your own immediate neighbourhood or envi ~ Christopher Hitchens

An Indian is an Indian regardless of the degree of Indian blood or which little government card they do or do not possess. ~ Wilma Mankiller

Hickock whistled and rolled his eyes. "Wow!" he said, and then, summoning his talent for something very like total recall, he began an account of the long ride
the approximately ten thousand miles he and Smith had covered in the past six weeks. He talked for an hour and twenty-five minutes
from two-fifty to four-fifteen
and told, while Nye attempted to list them, of highways and hotels, motels, rivers, towns, and cities, a chorus of entwining names: Apache, El Paso, Corpus Christi, Santillo, San Luis Potosi, Acapulco, San Diego, Dallas, Omaha, Sweetwater, Stillwater, Tenville Junction, Tallahassee, Needles, Miami, Hotel Nuevo Waldorf, Somerset Hotel, Hotel Simone, Arrowhead Motel, Cherokee Motel, and many, many more. He gave them the name of the man in Mexico to whom he'd sold his own 1940 Chevrolet, and confessed that he had stolen a newer model in Iowa. ~ Truman Capote

During the long healing process, I fell back on my Cherokee ways and adopted what our elders call "a Cherokee approach" to life. They say it is "being of good mind." That means one has to think positively, to take what is handed out and turn it into a better path. ~ Wilma Mankiller

A Georgia volunteer, afterward a colonel in the Confederate service, said: "I fought through the civil war and have seen men shot to pieces and slaughtered by thousands, but the Cherokee removal was the cruelest work I ever knew."34 ~ Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

Smallpox in a blanket, which the U.S. Army gave to the Cherokee Indians on their long march to the West, was nothing compared to what I'd like to see done to these people ~ Michael Savage

The Trail of Tears has a great deal of meaning for every person of American Indian ancestry, whether they are Cherokee or not. For me, it has always stood for what is best and worst about the history of the United States. ~ Joseph Bruchac

More than a third of all the men, women, and children on this march perished from cold, starvation, and disease. Thanks to President Andrew Jackson's Indian Removal Act, Cherokee land was left to white farmers who used it to grow cotton with slave labor and to mine gold. ~ Gloria Steinem

The Cherokee used to fear that taking a photo would make them lose their souls. Over exposure and desensitization is pretty close to losing one's soul. So they were right to quite an extent. ~ Sabine Shah

We are a revitalized tribe. After every major upheaval, we have been able to gather together as a people to rebuild a community and a government. Individually and collectively, Cherokee people possess an extraordinary ability to face down adversity and continue moving forward. We are able to do that because our culture, though certainly diminished, has sustained us since time inmemorial. This Cherokee culture is a well-kept secret. ~ Wilma Mankiller

I owned a Ferrari, a Range Rover, a Mercedes 560SL convertible, a Jeep Cherokee and a Nissan 300ZX. I can't remember the intricate decision tree I had to climb in order to determine which one to drive to work on any given day - it probably had something to do with the weather, or which car had more gas in the tank, or upholstery that best matched whatever shirt I happened to throw on that morning. ~ Michael J. Fox

Before you judge a person you have to walk in their moccasins and live in their lodge for a month. ~ Buddy Hannah

Long accustomed to the use of European manufactures, [the Cherokee Indians] are as incapable of returning to their habits of skinsand furs as we are, and find their wants the less tolerable as they are occasioned by a war [the American Revolution] the event of which is scarcely interesting to them. ~ Thomas Jefferson

There is a battle of two wolves inside us all. One is evil: it is anger, envy, greed, arrogance, jealousy, resentment, lies. The other is good: it is joy, peace, love, hope, humility, kindness, empathy, truth. The wolf that wins? The one you feed. - Cherokee proverb Spanning ~ Angela Stevens

I'm Irish and Cherokee Indian. I can't faint. ~ Lynn Collins

nunna daul Tsuny in the Cherokee language, ~ Mark Kurlansky

I was no Cherokee. I was no warrior. I was nobody special. I was just a girl, scared and angry. When I saw myself in Daddy Glen's eyes, I wanted to die. No, I wanted to be already dead, cold and gone. Everything felt hopeless. He looked at me and I was ashamed of myself. It was like sliding down an endless hole, seeing myself at the bottom, dirty, ragged, poor, stupid. ~ Dorothy Allison

Given the proper incentive, no mountain, it seems, is too high to climb, no current too swift to swim, if one is a Cherokee. ~ Grace Steele Woodward

The second thing that happened is, DNA analysis is much more sophisticated. All you have to do now is spit in a test tube and you find out all kind of things in six weeks - where they are from in Africa or Europe. You can prove or disprove the fundamental African-American myth that you descended from a Cherokee great, great grandmother. ~ Henry Louis Gates

Okay, just so we're clear," Piper said, "I'll show you where Jason and I entered the maze, but I'm not doing the stereotypical Native American tracker thing. I don't know tracking. I'm not your guide."
We all readily agreed, as one does when delivered an ultimatum by a friend with strong opinions and poison darts.
"Also," she continued, "if any of you find the need for spiritual guidance on this quest, I am not here to provide that service. I'm not going to dispense bits of ancient Cherokee wisdom."
"Very well," I aid. "Though as a former prophecy god, I enjoy bits of spiritual wisdom."
"Then you'll have to ask the satyr," Piper said.
Grover cleared his throat. "Um, recycling is good karma?"
"There you go," Piper said. ~ Rick Riordan

I grew up on hip-hop. I grew up on Run-D.M.C., Whodini, LL when I was in college, so I'm more of a music fan. I probably have the most eclectic collection of music in my Grand Cherokee. Literally, in a span of a week, I'll go from 2Pac to Boyz II Men to Sister Hazel, right down to West Side Story or the Wiz. I love show tunes. ~ Stuart Scott

American-ness-ness-ness
Some of us will authenticate our American-ness
by either claiming we've whooped ass in wartime
or have Cherokee blood dancing in our veins.
But what really defines us as Americans
is our unwavering conviction that we know all the words
from the theme songs of Cheers and Gilligan's island. ~ Beryl Dov

Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. My folks were Indian. Both my mother and father had Cherokee blood in them. I was born and raised in Indian Territory. 'Course we're not the Americans whose ancestors came over on the Mayflower, but we met them at the boat when they landed. ~ Will Rogers

One of the most important stories. Back when man first started destroying nature, the animals decided he was a threat. They all vowed to fight back. Each animal had a different way to kill humans. But the plants…they were kind and compassionate. They vowed the opposite - that they'd each find their own way to protect people. So, there's a plant cure for everything, whatever disease or poison or wound. Some plant has the cure. You just have to know which one! ~ Rick Riordan

I was told all my life I was part Cherokee. Then it was Crow. The latest is Blackfoot. ~ Kathie Lee Gifford

I was called "T-Bow" but the people got it mixed up with "T-Bone." My name is Aaron Walker but "T-Bone" is catchy, people remember it. My auntie gave it to me when I was a kid. Mother's mother was a Cherokee Indian full blooded. There were sixteen girls and two boys in my mother's family, all dead but two. ~ T-Bone Walker

Brother," wrote one Cherokee chief, "we give up to our white brothers all the land we could any how spare, and have but little left...and we hope you won't let any people take any more from us without our consent. We are neither birds nor fish; we can neither fly in the air nor live under water.... We are made by the same hand and in the same shape as yourselves. ~ Joseph J. Ellis

No one noticed Witch Baby as she went back inside the cottage, into the room she and Cherokee shared.
Cherokee's side of the room was filled with feathers, crystals, butterfly wings, rocks, shells and dried flowers. there was a small tepee that Coyote had helped Cherokee make. The walls on Witch Baby's side of the room were covered with newspaper clippings - nuclear accidents, violence, poverty and disease. Every night, before she went to bed, Witch Baby cut out three articles or pictures with a pair of toenail scissors and taped them to the wall. they make Cherokee cry.
"Why do you want to have those up there?" Weetzie asked. "You'll both have nightmares. ~ Francesca Lia Block

My tribute to mystical, magical trees that the Cherokee called "standing people ... " ~ Wallace Stevens

Our legal department was Stuart Dogs, one of the few fully human people on our payroll. He was a Cherokee from Oklahoma with a brutal legal mind and the enviable ability to simply not worry about weird shit that didn't concern him. ~ Misha Burnett

May the warm winds of heaven blow softly upon your house. May the Great Spirit bless all who enter there. May your mocassins make happy tracks in many snows, and may the rainbow always touch your shoulder. ~ American Indian Cherokee Blessing

Give me strength, not to be better than my enemies, but to defeat my greatest enemy, the doubts within myself. Give me strength for a straight back and clear eyes, so when life fades, as the setting sun, my spirit may come to you without shame. ~ P.C. Cast

It affords me sincere pleasure to be able to apprise you of the entire removal of the Cherokee Nation of Indians to their new homes west of the Mississippi. ~ Martin Van Buren

One day, a young boy went up to his grandfather, who was an old Cherokee chief. 'Edudi?' the boy asked. 'Why are you so sad?' The old chief bit his lip and rubbed his belly as if his stomach pained him unmercifully. 'There is a terrible fight inside me, Uhgeeleesee', the chief said sternly. 'One that will not let me sleep of give me peace'. 'A fight Grandfather? I don't understand. What kind of fight is inside you?' The old chief knelt in front of the boy to explain. 'Deep inside my heart, I have two wolves. Each strong enough to devour the other, they are locked in constant war. One is evil through and through. He is revenge, sorrow, regret, rage, greed, arrogance, stupidity, superiority, envy, guilt, lies, ego, false pride, inferiority, self-doubt, suspicion and resentment. The other wolf is everything kind. He is made of peace, blissful tranquillity, wisdom, love and joy, hope and humility, compassion, benevolence, generosity, truth, faith and empathy. They circle each other inside my heart and they fight one another at all times. Day and night. There is no letup. Not even while I slumber'. The boy's yes widened as he sucked his breath in sharply. 'How horrible for you'. His grandfather shook his head at these words and tapped the boy's chest right where his own heart was located. 'It's not just horrible for me. This same fight is also going on inside you and every single person who walks this earth with us'. Those words terrified the little boy. 'So tell me Grandfather, w ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

I think you people are just marvelous," she said in a dramatic manner, closing her eyes for a moment.

"You know, sometimes I hear the Great Spirit calling to me. Perhaps I was a squaw in my last life. My family would never talk about it when I was growing up, but I'm pretty sure my great-grandmother was a real Cherokee princess. Are you Cherokee, by any chance?"

"Cherokee to the bone, ma'am," Luther replied, giving Jimmy a wink.

"Oh, I knew it when I laid eyes on you," she responded and turned to Jimmy. "Are you also Cherokee?"

"No, ma'am. I wanted to be but I didn't have the grades to get in."

"Oh, you poor dear," the woman said, reaching over to pat him on the arm. ~ Robert Owings

One evening an elder Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside all people. He said, "My son, the battle is between two wolves inside us. One is Fear. It carries anxiety, concern, uncertainty, hesitancy, indecision and inaction. The other is Faith. It brings calm, conviction, confidence, enthusiasm, decisiveness, excitement and action." The grandson thought about it for a moment and then meekly asked his grandfather: "Which wolf wins?" The old Cherokee replied, "The one you feed. ~ Gary Keller

I am extremely excited to develop and design a brand representative of my life, experiences and style. Working closely with Cherokee will help establish a worldwide presence with best-in-class retailers and category leaders. ~ Alessandra Ambrosio

Chickamauga" is a Cherokee word meaning "river of death". *** ~ L.E. Johnson

I saw him with her last week, at a coffeehouse near my apartment. They were holding hands. She's captivated him."
"The Lakota Captive." Leta made a line in the air with her hand. "I can see it now, the wily, brave Lakota warrior with the brazen white woman pioneer. She carries him off into the sunset over her shoulder…"
Cecily whacked her with a strand of grass she'd pulled.
"You write history your way, I'll write it my way," Leta said wickedly.
"Native Americans are stoic and unemotional," Cecily reminded her. "All the books say so."
"We never read many books in the old days, so we didn't know that," came the dry explanation. She shook her head. "What a sad stereotype so many make of us-a bloodthirsty ignorant people who never smile because they're too busy torturing people over hot fires."
"Wrong tribe," Cecily corrected. She frowned thoughtfully. "That was the northeastern native people."
"Who's the Native American here, you or me?"
Cecily shrugged. "I'm German-American." She brightened. "But I had a grandmother who dated a Cherokee man once. Does that count?"
Leta hugged her warmly. "You're my adopted daughter. You're Lakota, even if you haven't got my blood. ~ Diana Palmer

My father was one-eighth Cherokee indian and my mother was quarter-blood Cherokee. I never got far enough in arithmetic to figure out how much injun that made me, but there's nothing of which I am more proud than my Cherokee blood. ~ Will Rogers