TIL: Sequoyah, the creator of the the Cherokee Syllabary, demonstrated the written language to his people and was then charged with and tried for witchcraft. The rest of the story...

Although the system was foolproof and easy to learn, Sequoyah and A-Yo-Ka were charged with witchcraft, and were brought before George Lowery, their town chief, for trial. Due to a Cherokee law enacted in 1811, it was mandated to have a civil trial before an execution was allowed to take place. Lowery brought in a group of warriors to judge what was termed a "sorcery trial." For evidence of the literacy claims, the warriors separated Sequoyah and his daughter to have them send messages between each other until they were finally convinced that the symbols on paper really represented talking.

At the end of the trial, the warriors asked Sequoyah to teach them this new skill. Within a week, all were able to read and write their own language.

By 1830's the Tsalagi nation had a literacy rate equal to (or even higher) than the white male population of N. America.

/r/todayilearned Thread Link - cherokee.org