[Looking at why our area has its unique political and religious attitudes.]

Sequoyah deciphered the Cherokee language, but how was his artistry moved from calligraphy to print in newspaper, books, and pamphlets?

We have already discussed articles relevant to Samuel Austin Worcester at Union Mission and his talented, storied grand-daughter Alice M. Robertson. But there is a backstory.

Samuel Austin Worcester (1798-1859) came to the planet at Worcester, Massachusetts. The family business was minister. One account affirms he was the eighth in a line, with more to follow.

Ministers have traditionally been the more-educated in society. The early universities in America were established to train the clergy. Consequently, ministers were often also teachers, scientists, advancers of technology, community leaders, political influencers, and dissenters against government constraint of unalienable rights.

The laws of nature (natural law), the laws of physics, and the laws of God are one and the same thing.

Unfortunately, in the past few generations, our society has educated specialists, who do not have a broad comprehension of how the outside world works or the history of how we got here.

So, they cannot understand or relate to rational discussion in an interchange of ideas. Consequently, feelings and emotion are the drive to control and suppress alternative thoughts.

Isaac Asimov succinctly addressed the issues facing our society now and in the past.

“Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that ‘my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

Being a wealthy computer geek, although requiring skill, does not of itself imbue or imply broad knowledge. In contrast, consider the role that theological thought has played on our understanding of science, culture, and history.

“Throughout the history of Western civilization, significant innovation has often come from individuals who are polymaths experienced in theology, philosophy, science, mathematics, and art. The cross-pollination of understanding seems to open opportunities for insight beyond the norm. Notable examples are Sir Francis Bacon, Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, Sir Isaac Newton, Dr. Michael Servetus, Rene Descartes, Sir Robert Boyle, John Locke, Rembrandt van Rijn, Baruch Spinoza, Dr. Gottfried Leibniz, Dr. Benjamin Franklin, Dr. Joseph Priestley, President Thomas Jefferson, William Blake, Johann Sebastian Bach, Pierre-Simon marquis de Laplace, Dr. Michael Faraday, Dr. James Clerk Maxwell, Dr. Max Planck, and myriad others. Even Einstein was a student of the God of Spinoza.”

Although from a broad spectrum of different societies, these intellectuals are within the Western cultural history. Other cultures and societies have their historical paragons. The Asian cultures have a long history of similar erudite leaders. Unfortunately, the cultures without a written history had no way to transfer the identities and accomplishments of their historical ancestors.

The lack of cultural history is not the fault of the dominant society.

Let us put the clash between the Native American and the New Americans in context. The conflict was not and is not racial. Intermarriage and friendship between cultures was common. If you had ancestors in the United States before the French and Indian War, you likely have Native American as well as New American bloodlines.

The conflict between cultures was economic, just as today.

Rather than challenge and attempt to overcome the accomplishments and society of Western civilization, Sequoyah and his colleagues embraced their birth heritage while embracing the technology of the prevailing society.

The Cherokee Nation survived and flourished, while other Native American as well as voluntary and involuntary immigrant cultures disappeared from history, except the portions recorded in the English language.

Sequoyah was an archetype of how a minority culture can flourish in a dominant society. Develop your language, record your history, maintain your culture, while having the advantages of the dominant society.

We know only a little about the Cherokee people before 1823, when Sequoyah gave a method of recording their history. Since then, the Cherokee have played a pivotal role in our state.

The Native American culture was strangled, the people destroyed, and property overrun, simply by the inertia of history.

The disaster was occurring at the very time Sequoyah and Worcester made the Cherokee Nation more literate than their dominant culture neighbors.

While investing his lifetime in the Cherokee people, the Reverend Samuel Worcester filled all the historical ministerial roles noted above.

Worcester’s lineage was the Rev. Leonard Worcester of Peacham, Vermont and Elizabeth Hopkins of Hadley, Massachusetts. Sam attended the University of Vermont where his namesake uncle, Rev. Samuel Austin, was president. Graduating with honors (1819) he next graduated from Andover Theological Seminary (1823), in common with other great leaders with a mission.

He married Ann Orr from Bedford, New Hampshire, before ordination as a Congregationalist (reformed Puritan) minister in Boston (1825). The young couple soon left to settle with the Cherokee.

Is not the timing interesting? Sequoyah developed his language in 1821, the Cherokee Nation adopted it in 1823, and the Worcesters joined them in 1825 and would become the printer, publisher, and propagator.

Think about the absence of cultural history without a written language or record. What is your contribution to intellectual, religious, and societal advancement? We all have a role.

Excerpts from our books:

Separatists, Spinoza, & Scientists: The Mavericks of Intellectual Freedom, ISBN: 9781797744827.

Where Indians, Outlaws & Oilmen Were Real, ISBN: 9781658834643.