Trail of Tears -

This is a multi- site trail that commemorates the suffering of the various Indian tribes that were affected by the policies of President Andrew Jackson in 1830 and later to remove the Native Americans from their homeland to the "promised lands" of Oklahoma. 

Here is an explanation from Wikipaedia:
The Trail of Tears is a name given to the forced relocation and movement of Native American nations from southeastern parts of the United States following the Indian Removal Act of 1830. The removal included many members of the Cherokee, Muscogee (Creek), Seminole, Chickasaw, and Choctaw nations, among others in the United States, from their homelands to Indian Territory (eastern sections of the present-day state of Oklahoma). The phrase originated from a description of the removal of the Choctaw Nation in 1831.^[1] Many Native Americans suffered from exposure, disease and starvation en route to their destinations. Many died, including 4,000 of the 15,000 relocated Cherokee.<sup>[2]


The site I visited today ( May 23) was the site called The Chieftan's Home, which was in Rome, Georgia. 

This was the ancestral home of a Major Ridge, who was instrumental in helping seal the doom of the Cherokee Indians in Northern Georgia.  He believed that the government would be true to their word, which of course, they were not.  Ridge ultimately paid for his act of approving the treaty with his life.</sup> 

The original house was much smaller, and the wings were added in the 1920's

The site has an interesting history as well, the home was used for many years as a "bosses" house for the senior executive for the Celanese Corporation, which was across the street and owned the property. 

Major Ridge

There are two other sites in Northern Georgia, but I couldn't get to them, since we had to leave this morning to get to South Carolina-  We'll revisit those sites in September on our return home, and also get up to Chattanooga.