Contributors to this Issue

Lloyd Arneach is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee who was raised in the Yellowhill Community of the Qualla Boundary and lives there now. He has been a professional storyteller since his retirement from a.t. & t. where he worked in Atlanta as a computer programmer. He has told stories at the Kennedy Center, the National Folklife Festival, and for the Discovery Channel. He is the author of two books, Long-Ago Stories of the Eastern Cherokee and The Animal’s Ballgame as well as a cd, Can You Hear the Smoke?

D. L. Birchfield is a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma and a Professor of Native American Studies at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta, Canada. He is the author of nineteen books for children, an essay collection, two novels, and a legal history of Choctaw Nation treaties.

Nakesha Bradley is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band who grew up in the Yellowhill Community and now lives in the Birdtown Community on the Qualla Boundary. She has been employed for nine years as a chef at Harrah’s Cherokee Casino. She has been published in three literary anthologies, two of which were edited by MariJo Moore and in Shifting Winds, the Cherokee High School literary magazine.

Mary Brown is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band who lives in Snowbird and has a B. S. degree in Child Development and Family Relations from Western Carolina University. She enjoys teaching the Cherokee language and doing bead work and other traditional crafts.

Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle has an undergraduate degree from Yale and a Master’s from William and Mary, both in American Studies. She is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band who has lived most of her life near the Qualla Boundary. She teaches English at nearby Swain County High School.

Robert J. Conley has published over eighty books in poetry, story, novel and non-fiction, including the official history of the Cherokee Nation and The Cherokee Encyclopedia. He currently serves as the Sequoyah Distinguished Professor of Cherokee Studies at Western Carolina University [End Page 116] and lives in Sylva, North Carolina. His recent awards include the Arrel M. Gibson Lifetime Achievement Award from the Oklahoma Center for the Book and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers Circle of the Americas. He is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation.

Rayna J. Davis is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band who lives in the Painttown Community on the Qualla Boundary. She is a junior at Cherokee High School where she participates in volleyball, basketball and track. This is her first published poem.

Debora Kinsland Foerst teaches tenth-grade English and journalism at Cherokee High School. Her work has been published in half a dozen literary magazines and anthologies including Appalachian Heritage. She grew up in Yellowhill and currently lives in the Painttown Community and is a descendent of enrolled members of the Eastern Band.

Diane Glancy is professor emeritus at Macalester College. She is still working on the story of the 1838–39 Cherokee removal to Indian Territory. In 1996, she published Pushing the Bear. In 2009, she published Pushing the Bear, after the Trail of Tears. Now she is working on The Unsettling, which is a manuscript of life for the Cherokees around 1820, before the Trail of Tears. She is also the author of three other novels, two collections of poetry, a book of essays and a story collection. She considers herself an undocumented Cherokee.

Gerri Wolfe Grady is an Accounting Coordinator II for the Eastern Band who graduated from Montreat College magna cum laude, with a degree in Business Administration, and was editor of The Legend, the Cherokee High School newspaper when she was a student there. She lived as a child in the Big Cove Community and has lived in Yellowhill since the mid-sixties. She is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band.

B. Lynne Harlan serves as Public Relations Coordinator for the Eastern Band and is on the Editorial Board of the Asheville Citizen Times, which regularly carries her columns, as well as the Boards of the Museum of the Cherokee Indian, the Cherokee Chamber of Commerce, and the Sequoyah National Golf Club. She grew up in Painttown and lives in Wolfetown and is enrolled in the Eastern Band which published The Cherokees, a book that she co-authored. She is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Asheville. [End Page 117]

Marie L. Junaluska served for twelve years as Cherokee Council Member for Painttown. She serves on the Boards of the Museum of the Cherokee Indian, the Culturally-Based Native Health Program, and the Cherokee Youth Council. She has been active in promoting the Cherokee language and the arts and was on the task force that created The Cherokee Heritage Trails Guidebook. She is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band.

Martha Ledford grew up in Snowbird and currently lives in Wolfetown. She is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band and works as a Cherokee Language Development Supervisor with the Kituwah Preservation and Education Program. This is her first published prose piece.

Jeffrey H. McCoy is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band who works in landscaping and construction. He grew up in Yellowhill and Wolfetown, and now lives in Wolfetown. This is his first published work.

MariJo Moore is of Irish, Dutch, and Cherokee descent and grew up in Western Tennessee. She now lives in Candler, North Carolina, and is the author of a dozen books and the editor of five anthologies of American Indian Writing. She has led writing workshops on the Qualla Boundary.

Logan Tatsi Nelson is a freshman at Swain County High School who lives in the Big Cove Community on the Qualla Boundary and is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band.

Paula M. Nelson is a performance artist, a visual and textile artist, a songwriter, and a poet who lives in Big Cove and is enrolled in the Eastern Band.

Freeman Owle is a wood and stone carver and storyteller from the Birdtown Community and is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band. He taught sixth grade at Cherokee Elementary for fourteen years and has an M.A. in Education from Western Carolina University. He has contributed stories to books and interviews to pbs documentaries.

Billie Jo Rich is the Community Mobilization Coordinator of the Kituwah Preservation and Education Program. She is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band and grew up in Big Cove and lives in Painttown. She has published stories in Milestone, the literary magazine of Southwestern Community College in Sylva, North Carolina. [End Page 118]

Sean Ross, the Advertising Manager of Harrah’s Cherokee Casino, grew up in the Yellowhill Community and lives there now. He is a graduate of Guilford College in Greensboro, North Carolina, and an enrolled member of the Eastern Band. His art has appeared in numerous magazines and books.

Sallie Arch–Smoker works part time as a translator for the Eastern Band Council and Western Carolina University. She lives in Wolfetown where she was raised and is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band. This is her first published essay.

Sarah Margaret Sneed is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band and lives in the Birdtown Community of the Qualla Boundary. She graduated magna cum laude in history from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and received a Juris doctorate from Harvard Law School.

Nannie Taylor does consulting on the Cherokee Language for Western Carolina University and lives in the Wolfetown Community on the Qualla Boundary where she was raised. She is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band. This is her first print publication.

Alicia Whiteside is a sophomore at Cherokee High School and is a musician. She is a life-long resident of the Wolfetown Community on the Qualla Boundary and is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band. This is her first published poem.

Robert S. Youngdeer was Principal Chief of the Eastern Band in the 1980s and also served on the National Advisory Council on Indian Education. A World War II veteran, he was shot in the head at Guadalcanal as a Marine and later served in the Army. After retiring from the military, he worked for thirteen years for the Bureau of Indian Affairs as a law enforcement officer all over the country. In 1973 he retired from that service and returned to Cherokee where he was raised and was almost immediately elected to the Cherokee Council. An enrolled member of the Eastern Band, he is currently retired and lives in Big Cove. [End Page 119]

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