Food

Cherokee Trail of Tears bean

Phaseolus vulgaris (Cherokee Trail of Tears landrace)

Also known as: Trail of Tears bean, Cherokee black bean

A heirloom pole bean carried by the Cherokee people on the 1838–1839 forced removal from their southeastern Appalachian homelands to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) — the journey known as the Trail of Tears that killed an estimated 4,000 of the 16,000 Cherokee forced to walk it. Seeds were carried in pockets, hems, and pouches by surviving Cherokee families and planted at the journey's end. The variety has been continuously cultivated by Cherokee descendants ever since, transmitted through seven generations of family seedkeeper practice. Pods are 6–7 inches, purple-streaked when young, drying to a black bean with a small white eye. Slow Food USA Ark of Taste species. The variety is both a foodway and a memorial — the seed itself a continuous physical object linking living Cherokee gardeners to the survivors who carried it on the walk.

Cultural

In May 1838, U.S. military forces under President Martin Van Buren and the Indian Removal Act began the forced relocation of the Cherokee Nation from its southeastern Appalachian homelands to Indian Territory in present-day Oklahoma. Approximately 16,000 Cherokee were marched 1,200 miles through the winter of 1838–1839; an estimated 4,000 died on the journey from exposure, starvation, and disease. The journey is remembered in Cherokee as Nu na da ul tsun yi — “the place where they cried” — and in English as the Trail of Tears.

Surviving Cherokee families carried what they could on the walk. Among the items carried by some families were small bean seeds — pole-bean varieties that had been cultivated in Cherokee gardens for generations and that, when the survivors reached Indian Territory, were planted in the new ground. The variety known today as the Cherokee Trail of Tears bean is the continuous descendant of one such carried seedstock.

The bean has been cultivated by Cherokee descendants in Oklahoma and across the Cherokee diaspora continuously since 1839 — passed through [[seven-generation-principle|seven generations]] of family seedkeeper practice, often without ever entering commercial seed channels. The variety entered broader heirloom-bean circulation in the 1970s when Cherokee seedkeeper Dr. John Wyche shared seed with the [[seed-savers-exchange|Seed Savers Exchange]] in Iowa; it is now widely available through heritage-seed channels.

The bean is both food and memorial. The continued cultivation of the variety by Cherokee gardeners is a continuing physical link to the survivors who carried it. Eating the bean, growing the bean, saving its seed are all forms of continuing Cherokee cultural practice that the forced removal failed to destroy.

Practical

Pole habit; vines reach 6–8 feet. Pods 6–7 inches, purple-and-green streaked when young (edible as snap beans at this stage), drying to mature pods that yield small black-seeded beans with a small white eye. Productive in most U.S. climates; well-adapted to humid summers. Disease-resistant; tolerates moderate drought. The variety is genuinely good both fresh-podded and as a dry bean — among the better heirloom black beans for soup and stew applications.

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Cultural

shares approach with

Moon and Stars watermelon comparable seedkeeper-preserved heritage variety surviving through small-community continuity

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Cultural

Practical

See also

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