Cherokee Summer House
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Corn Cribs
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Dugout Canoe

Cherokee Summer House, also, Corn Cribs, also, Dugout Canoe. . , Cherokee Summer House , (go-ga ga-la-tso-de) , The rectangular summer houses were built with a framework of vertical posts supporting a gabled roof. The roof was often covered with slabs of bark or grass thatch. The walls may have been either completely enclosed with wattle and daub or partially covered. In some cases the gable ends were left open as smoke holes. The covered walls were constructed of cane and saplings woven tightly through the upright vertical posts and daubed with clay. Some summer houses were as long as 60-70 feet and may have had a second story. Location and terrain seemed to dictate the size of these structures. In the mountainous villages where the river valleys were narrow and more prone to flooding, the houses tended to be smaller. Summer houses served primarily as the warm weather residences. Cooking was most likely done within the confines of the summer house as well as outside, weather permitting. Cherokee women made and tended the fires, cutting and gathering the wood as well., Corn Cribs , (se-lu tsu-ni-s-qua-hi-go-di) , The only other 18th century village or homestead structures described eyewitness accounts are corn cribs. William DeBrahm explains:... their Corn Houses are built... raised upon four posts, four and some five feet high from the ground; its floor is made of round poles, on which the corn worms cannot lodge, but fall through, and thus the Indians preserve their Corn from being destroyed by the-weevils a whole year." James Mooney also describes a corn house as a... "storehouse built upon poles high up from the ground, to keep it out of reach of animals, and there was a ladder to climb up by, and one door, but no other opening." He also states that this structure was "the...storehouse for corn, beans, dried pumpkins and other provisions... and was a feature of every Cherokee homestead.", Dugout Canoe , (tsi-yu / a-mo ga-du-I e-do tsi-yu) Dugout canoes have been used as a mode of transportation for thousands of years. Before contact with Europeans, the Cherokee's principle modes of transportation were by foot and canoe. They built their canoes with controlled burning and stone tools. A large tree, usually poplar or white pine, was felled by burning through at the base. First a coating of daub (mud and straw) was applied around the tree trunk to protect the tree above the base fire. As the fire burned through the trunk, stone tools were used to scrape and chip away the charred wood until the fire had burned through, allowing the tree to fall. After the tree was stripped of its bark, a series of fires were started on top of the log to burn and hollow out the center. This was a long, laborious process taking up to six months for a large canoe. Patching cracks and waterproofing were accomplished using a mixture of heated pine pitch, ground charcoal, and bear fat. Canoes used to navigate rivers, such as the Tennessee or French Broad, were thirty to forty feet long and could carry as many as twelve to twenty people. Shorter canoes were built for use on smaller rivers and streams like the Hiwassee. Trade with Europeans enabled the Cherokee to obtain metal tools, including adzes and axes. This greatly reduced the time it took to build the canoes. At least two 18th century Cherokee canoes have survived to the present. A white pine cance, found in the Chattahoochee River near Helen, GA, is on display in the Museum of the Cherokee Indian, in Cherokee, N.C. The Frank McClung Museum, at the University of Tennessee, houses a yellow poplar canoe found in the Tennessee River, Lt. Henry Timberlake in his records observed in the mid-1700s, that the "canoes are generally made of large pine or poplar from 30 to 40 feet long and about 2 feet broad with flat bottoms and sides and capable of carrying 15 to 20 men, are very light and can by the Indians, so great is their skill, be forced up a very strong current."