(Image: Sequoyah teaching Ahyokey the Cherokee syllabary) "Sequoyah, the originator of the Cherokee syllabary, was born in the Cherokee town of Tuskegee (or Taskigi) on the Little Tennessee River in what is now Monroe County. The son of Nathaniel Gist (or Guess), a Virginia fur trader, and Wurtah (also known as Wureth or Wut-teh), daughter of a prominent Cherokee family, Sequoyah rose to international prominence as the first known individual to create a totally new system of writing."
