John Rollin Ridge - Wikipedia John Rollin Ridge From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigation Jump to search American novelist and newspaper editor "Cheesquatalawny" redirects here. For other people called Yellow Bird, see Yellow Bird (disambiguation) § people. John Rollin Ridge Born Chee-squa-ta-law-ny (Yellow Bird)--more accurately, "tsisgwa daloni" (1827-03-19)March 19, 1827 New Echota, Cherokee Nation (now Georgia) Died October 5, 1867(1867-10-05) (aged 40) Grass Valley, California Cause of death encephalitis lethargia ("Brain fever") Resting place Grass Valley, California Nationality American, British Other names Chee-squa-ta-law-ny (Yellow Bird) Citizenship London Occupation Novelist, newspaperman Spouse(s) Elizabeth Wilson Parent(s) John Ridge Sarah Bird Northrup Signature John Rollin Ridge (Cherokee name: Cheesquatalawny, or Yellow Bird,[1] March 19, 1827 – October 5, 1867), a member of the Cherokee Nation, is considered the first Native American novelist. Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early life and education 1.2 On the run 1.3 Writing career 1.3.1 The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta 1.4 Civil War and the Southern Cherokee delegation 2 Death 3 Bibliography 4 References 5 Further reading 6 External links Biography[edit] Early life and education[edit] Born in New Echota, Georgia, he was the son of John Ridge, and the grandson of Major Ridge, both of whom were signatories to the Treaty of New Echota, which Congress affirmed in early 1836, ceding Cherokee lands east of the Mississippi River and ultimately leading to the Trail of Tears. At the age of twelve, Ridge witnessed his father's death at the hands of supporters of Cherokee leader John Ross, who had vehemently opposed the treaty. His mother, Sarah Bird Northrup (a white woman), took him and fled to Fayetteville, Arkansas. In 1843, he was sent to the Great Barrington School in Great Barrington, Massachusetts for two years, after which he returned to Fayetteville to study law.[2] It was during this period that his first known writing appeared in print. He published a poem, "To a Thunder Cloud," in the Arkansas State Gazette.[3] He married Elizabeth Wilson, a white woman, in 1847. They had one daughter, Alice, in 1848. On the run[edit] In 1849, he killed Ross sympathizer David Kell, whom he thought had been involved with his father's assassination, over a horse dispute.[1] Despite having a good argument for self-defense, he fled to Missouri to avoid prosecution.[4] The next year, he joined in the California Gold Rush, but disliked being a miner.[2] While there, he was reunited with his wife and daughter.[5] Writing career[edit] His writing career began with poetry (published posthumously)[2] and essays for the Democratic Party before what is now considered the first Native American novel and the first novel written in California, The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta: The Celebrated California Bandit (1854).[1] A fictionalized version of the notorious bandit's story, the tale describes a young Mexican who comes to California to seek his fortune during the Gold Rush and turns to crime after his wife is raped and his brother murdered by white men. This novel, which condemned American racism especially towards Mexicans, later inspired the Zorro stories.[citation needed] Although widely popular, Ridge saw no money from the book's publication—by the time of his death it had not yet even turned a profit.[6] Ridge was a writer and the first editor of the Sacramento Bee and also wrote for the San Francisco Herald, among other publications.[1] As an editor, he advocated assimilationist policies for American Indians as his father had, placing his trust in the federal government to protect their rights. At the same time, however, he was blind to the ways in which those rights were continually abused by the same government.[2] Despite his novel's stance against racism, Ridge had owned slaves on his Arkansas property[1] and felt that California Indians were inferior to those of other tribes.[5] The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta[edit] See also: The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta Ridge's novel, one of the earliest by a Native American author, is curious both because it is written not about a Native American subject, but about a Mexican immigrant, and because it is not original but based on a legendary figure widely discussed in the media of the day. Ridge presents the figure of Joaquin Murieta as that of a young, innocent and industrious man who is hampered in his attempts to be successful in the United States by the racism of the people and by the 1850 Foreign Miner's Tax Law, which severely hampered the ability of Latinos to mine for gold. Ridge's version of Murieta becomes a bandit who attracts a large number of associates and who terrorizes the state of California for several months with his gruesome acts of violence. At the same time, Ridge's Murieta is a romantic figure, often showing kindness (especially to women) and relishing the stories about him, even as he keeps his identity so well secret that he can walk through town in broad daylight with no one recognizing him. Although the novel is fictional, many people took it as fact and some historians even cited it when writing biographical materials on Murrieta.[6] Civil War and the Southern Cherokee delegation[edit] During the Civil War, Ridge openly supported the "Copperheads" and opposed both the election of Abraham Lincoln as well as the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, blaming the war on abolitionists.[2] After the war, Ridge was invited by the federal government to head the Southern Cherokee delegation in postwar treaty proceedings. Despite his best efforts, the Cherokee region was not admitted as a state to the Union.[2] Death[edit] In December 1866, Ridge returned to his home in Grass Valley, California, where he died of "brain fever" (Encephalitis lethargica) on October 5, 1867.[7] He was buried at Greenwood Memorial Park in Grass Valley.[8] Bibliography[edit] The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta, the Celebrated California Bandit (San Francisco: W.B. Cooke and Company, 1854) (San Francisco: Fred MacCrellish & Co., 3rd ed., 1871) (Hollister, California: Evening Free Lance, 1927) (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1955) (University of Oklahoma Press, 1969) Poems, by a Cherokee Indian, with an Account of the Assassination of His Father, John Ridge (San Francisco: H. Payot, 1868) The Lives of Joaquin Murieta and Tiburcio Vasquez; the California Highwaymen (San Francisco: F. MacCrellish & Co., 1874) California's Age of Terror: Murieta and Vasquez (Hollister, California: Evening Free Lance, 1927) Crimes and Career of Tiburcio Vasquez, the Bandit of San Benito County and Notorious Early California Outlaw (Hollister, California: Evening Free Lance, 1927) References[edit] ^ a b c d e "John Rollin Ridge (1827-1867)". New Georgia Encyclopedia. Retrieved September 20, 2005. ^ a b c d e f "Ridge, John Rollin (Yellow Bird)". Encyclopedia of North American Indians. Archived from the original on February 12, 2006. Retrieved February 23, 2006. ^ Gordon Fraser. "Yellow Bird and the Thunder: On Finding the Earliest Known Poem by John Rollin Ridge, the First Native American Novelist." Common-place. 14.4 (2014). http://www.common-place.org/vol-14/no-04/tales/#.VNU_6NLF-So ^ Somerville, Richard (November 1, 2003). "The legendary life of John Rollin Ridge". The Union. Archived from the original on 13 August 2012. Retrieved 24 June 2011. ^ a b Noy, Gary (September 17, 2005). "The California Bandit and Yellow Bird". The Union. ^ a b "John Rollin Ridge (Yellow Bird) (1827-1867)". American Passages: A Literary Survey. Retrieved February 23, 2006. ^ " American Indian Biography: John Rollin Ridge, Cherokee Writer." Posted by Ojibwa on Native American Netroots, January 4, 2011. Retrieved July 9, 2014. ^ Alice Huitt Preston (4 September 2004). "John Rollin Ridge". Find a Grave. Retrieved 2 January 2008. Further reading[edit] Parins, James (1991). John Rollin Ridge: His Life and Works. University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-8780-1. External links[edit] Wikimedia Commons has media related to John Rollin Ridge. Biography portal Page images of The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta John Rollin Ridge at Find a Grave Authority control BNF: cb17138874m (data) GND: 119043289 ISNI: 0000 0000 2993 3964 LCCN: n85828113 NTA: 33122982X SNAC: w6kw5j4c SUDOC: 120660482 VIAF: 77117127 WorldCat Identities: lccn-n85828113 Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=John_Rollin_Ridge&oldid=1000909061" Categories: 19th-century American novelists American male novelists Native American novelists Cherokee people Novelists from Georgia (U.S. state) Writers from Arkansas Native Americans in the American Civil War Cherokee Nation (1794–1907) People from Fayetteville, Arkansas 1827 births 1867 deaths People from Gordon County, Georgia People from Grass Valley, California American newspaper editors 19th-century American journalists American male journalists 19th-century American male writers Journalists from California Novelists from California Cherokee writers Hidden categories: Articles with short description Short description is different from Wikidata Biography with signature Articles with hCards All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from January 2018 Commons category link is on Wikidata Wikipedia articles with BNF identifiers Wikipedia articles with GND identifiers Wikipedia articles with ISNI identifiers Wikipedia articles with LCCN identifiers Wikipedia articles with NTA identifiers Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers Wikipedia articles with VIAF identifiers Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers Navigation menu Personal tools Not logged in Talk Contributions Create account Log in Namespaces Article Talk Variants Views Read Edit View history More Search Navigation Main page Contents Current events Random article About Wikipedia Contact us Donate Contribute Help Learn to edit Community portal Recent changes Upload file Tools What links here Related changes Upload file Special pages Permanent link Page information Cite this page Wikidata item Print/export Download as PDF Printable version In other projects Wikimedia Commons Languages العربية Català Español Français مصرى Edit links This page was last edited on 17 January 2021, at 09:24 (UTC). Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization. Privacy policy About Wikipedia Disclaimers Contact Wikipedia Mobile view Developers Statistics Cookie statement