My Native American Ancestry

 

I was born in Tahlequah, Oklahoma at the W.W. Hastings Indian clinic in Tahlequah, Oklahoma about 50 miles southeast of Tulsa. Tahlequah is the capital of the Cherokee Nation. I’m a quarter Cherokee Indian on my dad’s side and am 1/16 Creek Indian on my mom’s. That makes my dad half and my grandma a full-blood Cherokee indian. She was a Lossie and married a Reece. Later W.W. Hastings Indian hospital was built in Tahlequah and the clinic became the College of Optometry for Northeastern State University. In 1889 this was the location of the Cherokee National Female Seminary. Later the building was purchased by the Oklahoma Legislature and in time NSU was established. I graduated from NSU in 1996 and later returned to take a few classes toward getting a teaching certificate. It was at the NSU-Muskogee campus that I met Misty, my wife, who is half Creek. My Indian ancestral line dates back to Georgia and North Carolina. My great grandma was Nora Rattler. She married my great granddad Charley Lossie. They met at the Chilocco Indian Agricultural School located north of Ponca City near the Kansas border and went to school there until the eleventh grade. Charley Lossie traveled as a young man to Oklahoma and is of the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indians. They are located in North Carolina and did not take part in the Indian removal of the 1830’s. My great grandma’s dad was Rider Rattler. He was born in 1868 in Indian Territory. His wife was Lizzie (Qua-Lar-Yu-Ga) Cramp was born in 1871 in the Canadian District of Indian Territory. The Canadian District was in Indian Territory and located just north of the Canadian River in Southeastern Oklahoma. My dad was also born in that area at home near the town of Porum. Today my dad lives in Whitefield which is 10 miles to the south of Porum and 6 miles to the west of Stigler, where we lived before moving to Broken Arrow. Lizzie’s grandpa’s name was Watt-Wa-De. He was born in 1835 in Georgia and died in Indian Territory in 1878. The Indian removal took place according to tribe and the Cherokee removal took place beginning in 1836. I believe my great-great-great-great- grandpa and his son Watt-Wa-De was part of what is known as the “Trail of Tears”. I know that God knows the times and the bounds of our habitation. It was God that gathered the Indians here. It was God that sent Doyle to Tulsa to preach the gospel to the people of Oklahoma (Okla meaning people and humma meaning red) of which I am one. And it was God that raised me up so that I could preach the gospel.

God Bless

Anthony

5/26/2010

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