Editing Swain County, North Carolina (section)

==History==
[[File:Swain-county-courthouse-nc1.jpg|thumb|Former [[Swain County Courthouse]] in Bryson City]]
This area was occupied for thousands of years by cultures of indigenous peoples, who successively settled in the valleys of the three rivers and their tributaries. During the [[Woodland culture|Woodland]] and [[South Appalachian Mississippian culture]] period, the latter beginning about 1000 CE, the peoples built earthwork [[platform mounds]] as their central public architecture. The more influential villages were each organized around a single mound with smaller villages nearby. The earliest European explorers, including two Spanish expeditions of the mid-to-late 16th century, are believed to have encountered Mississippian [[chiefdom]]s in some parts of the interior of the Southeast.

The historic [[Cherokee people]] emerged as a culture, and they became the primary occupants of a large homeland taking in what is now known as western Virginia, western North and South Carolina, southeastern Tennessee, northeast Georgia and northern Alabama. Numerous Cherokee towns were located along the [[Tuckaseegee River]] in this area, including [[Kituwa]] above the confluence with the [[Little Tennessee River]]. It is considered the Cherokee 'mother town'. The [[Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians]] (EBCI) acquired the Kituwa mound and former town site in 1996, and preserve it as sacred ground.

After the American Revolutionary War, more European Americans moved into this territory, seeking new lands west of the Appalachian Mountains. They came into increasing conflict with the Cherokee and other tribes whose territory they encroached on. Under President [[Andrew Jackson]], Congress passed the [[Indian Removal Act]] of 1830, to force the [[Five Civilized Tribes]] out of the Southeast. He used federal army forces to round up and accompany most of the Cherokee to [[Indian Territory]] west of the Mississippi River (the area was later admitted in 1907 as the state of Oklahoma).

Population growth was slow in the more isolated Swain County. It was not organized by European Americans until 1871 during the [[Reconstruction era]], when it was formed from parts of [[Jackson County, North Carolina|Jackson]] and [[Macon County, North Carolina|Macon]] counties. It was named for [[David L. Swain]], [[governor of North Carolina]] from 1832 to 1835 during the time of [[Indian Removal]], and president of the [[University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill|University of North Carolina]] from 1835 to 1868.

Present-day [[Bryson City, North Carolina|Bryson City]], designated as the county seat, developed on both sides of the Tuckaseegee River, which passes and completely surrounds the Bryson City Island Park. After that, it enters Fontana Lake and flows into the Little Tennessee River.

In 1868 the federal government recognized the [[Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians]], made up of people who had stayed at the time of removal and their descendants. In the 1870s, they purchased within what is now Swain County the land area that became known the "Qualla Boundary" land trust.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.ncpedia.org/qualla-boundary|title = Qualla Boundary &#124; NCpedia}}</ref><ref>Cherokee Indians - Part 1: Overview | NCpediawww.ncpedia.org › cherokee › "These people and their descendants were recognized in 1868 by the federal government as the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. In the early 2000s these Cherokee, living on the Qualla Boundary in the western part of the state, were the only Indian tribe in North Carolina fully recognized by the federal government."</ref> They are the only federally recognized tribe in North Carolina.