A house divided
Does the Chief John Ross House belong in Rossville, Georgia, where it sits today near where it was built in 1797 (or the mid-1810s, depending on whom you believe), or in Oklahoma, where Ross led detachments of Cherokee following the Trail of Tears removal from the Tennessee Valley in the 1830s?
Apparently a decision has been made as to its fate, but the Chief John Ross House Association president isn’t revealing it yet.
The house is significant to the Chattanooga area because Ross was the founder of Ross’s Landing, which eventually became the city of Chattanooga. However, as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation from 1828 to 1866, Ross’s later life was spent in Oklahoma, where he is buried after dying on a visit to Washington, D.C.