Cherokee History and the Spirit Family

by James Neil Barnes

Overview

Thoroughly researched and eloquently told by author and Spirit family descendant James Barnes, this resonant, non-fiction history showcases the amazing resiliency of a people who refuse to let suffering keep them from maintaining joy, love, and cultural identity. Follow the Spirit family from 1826-1910, through one of the darkest periods of cultural persecution in our nation's history, as they fight, grieve, and advocate for the Cherokee Nation's sovereignty in the face of steep opposition from the United States government.

A multi-generational account of perseverance and hope, Barnes skillfully weaves his family's and Nation's history together to bring both alive. Providing both a broad historical canvas for understanding Cherokee history and an intimate view of family lives during the critical periods of removal, the Civil War, and Allotment, this book will resonate deeply with audiences of all backgrounds.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781959203070
Publisher:	University of North Georgia
Publication date:	01/23/2024
Pages:	524
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.05(d)

About the Author

Jim Barnes was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1944. He and his family visited his Cherokee paternal grandmother, Nellie Maude Mayes, her siblings, Maggie and Hazel, and other relatives in Muskogee several times a year until he was 12. Maude was a teacher, painter, and musician who imbued Jim with a passion for Cherokee history. Graduating from Eastern High School in Middletown, Kentucky as class president in 1962, he attended Northwestern University in Chicago, receiving a BA in Economics in 1966. He received a Juris Doctor degree cum laude from the University of Michigan in 1970. After clerking for U.S. District Judge John Pratt in Washington, DC Jim joined the litigation team opposing the Alaska Pipeline project at the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP). He served as a public defender for two years in Washington and for one year in the New Hebrides Islands before rejoining CLASP in 1977. He served as CLASP co-director from 1981-82. While there, Jim founded the Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition (ASOC), bringing together environmental organizations around the world to advocate for the protection of Antarctica. Jim led successful campaigns to create the world's first "ecosystem-as-a-whole" fishing regime in 1980-to block a proposed treaty that would have opened Antarctica to drilling and mining in 1988-and develop the Environmental Protocol as part of the Antarctic Treaty in 1991, which bans minerals activities indefinitely and created a modern governance structure for the region. Jim retired as ASOC Executive Director in 2015 and today serves as Board Chair. In 2016 he began researching the lives of Annie Spirit and her extended family, and the larger story of Cherokee sovereignty, which resulted in this book. Jim has two daughters, Deborah Barnes and Sociana Clark, four grandchildren, and is married to Anne Fuhrman. They live in Villamblard, France.