Friends of Chieftains, INC (Chieftains Museum/Major Ridge Home)

To preserve and interpret the history of the 19th century Cherokee through the life, home and property of the Ridge family.

Since 1969, the Chieftains Museum/Major Ridge Home, through its passionate team of volunteers and staff members, has worked diligently to save the Major Ridge Home and interpret the complex story it represents. Major Ridge, the first known owner of this house, was a Cherokee leader who played a pivotal role in Native American and United States history of the 19th century. Chieftains now seeks to become a leading visitor destination through a rehabilitation of the Major Ridge home and farm that will immerse visitors in early 19th century Cherokee culture and the momentous events that led to the Trail of Tears, the 1830s expulsion of Cherokees from their ancestral homelands in the Southeast.