So as I continue my celebration of the Great Smoky, today I want to talk about the Cherokee.  Unfortunately, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park doesn’t give us as much information on the original inhabitants as it could.  Perhaps the closeness of the Cherokee Reservation plays a part, I am not sure.  While the GSMNP has plenty of records of white settlements and structures in the park which it has restored, the Cherokee are only mentioned on wayside markers and in visitors’ centers.  To get the story of the Cherokee one has to head over to the Oconaluftee Reservation.  While there check out the Museum of the Cherokee Indian.  For more information on the Cherokee go to the Cherokee Historical Association website.