When Origin Stories Collide

How my search for my family’s roots intersected with the Cherokee Nation — and The 1619 Project

Black Freedmen, descended from those enslaved by Cherokee Indians, protest their expulsion on September 2, 2011, outside a regional Bureau of Indian Affairs office in Muskogee, Okla. Marilyn Vann, in pink, is the president of the Descendants of Freedmen Association. | Credit: Alex Kellogg/NPR