Creating the Cherokee alphabet. Born to a Cherokee mother and English fur-trader father sometime between 1760 – 1776 near the Cherokee village of Tushkeegee on the Tennessee River, he became obsessed with creating a means for his people to communicate by making marks on paper as the whites did. In 1821, he displayed his "syllabary" to tribal elders. Within a few years thousands of Cherokees had learned to read and write in their own language.