Redbird Smith was born into a Cherokee family on July 19, 1850 in Indian Territory, near the current city ofFort Smith, Arkansas. His father was Pig Redbird Smith, who was given his surname by European Americans, noting that he worked as a blacksmith. Redbird Smith's mother was Lizzie Smith. His parents had been removed from Georgia to Indian Territory. Both his parents were ardent traditionalists. When Redbird Smith was ten, his "father dedicated him to the services and cause of the Cherokee people in accordance with ancient customs and usages."
Political activism
In the late 19th century the Dawes Commission under the Dawes Act. It was ordered to carry out registration of members of Indian tribes, in order to make allotments of communal lands to individual households. This was to be a means to convert Native Americans to the European-American model of subsistence farming. Any lands remaining after such allotment were to be declared "surplus" and the United States government would put them up for sale, including to non-natives. Redbird Smith led a political resistance movement to the Dawes Allotment Act and sought to return to traditional Cherokee religious nationalism and values. In 1887 and 1889, Smith served as a tribal councilor from the Illinois District of the Cherokee Nation. Smith said in the early 1900s: Smith repatriated wampum belts belonging to his tribe. In 1910 he was selected as chief of the Nighthawk Keetoowahs. Previously he had served as their chairman. Also in 1910, Smith and fellow Nighthawks traveled to Mexico with an 1820 document supporting Cherokee lands claims from when bands had lived there, but the Mexican government did not support their claims. In 1914, he petitioned President Woodrow Wilson to create a Keetoowah reservation, but the US government rejected the idea, believing that reservations hindered its assimilation policy for Native Americans. In 1921, one hundred Cherokee from 35 families moved together to the southeastern corner of Cherokee County, Oklahoma, to create a traditional community. This was "the brainchild of Redbird Smith."
After falling ill for 48 hours, Redbird Smith died on November 8, 1918. He is buried in the Redbird Smith Cemetery in Sequoyah County, Oklahoma. He served as chief of the Nighthawk Keetoowahs until his death and was succeeded for a short period by Levi Gritts. His son Sam Smith became chief of the Nighthawk Keetowahs on April 7, 1919. The Redbirth Smith ground is an active ceremonial ground. Redbird Smith, Oklahoma, Sequoyah County, was named for him. Smith's birthday on July 19 is celebrated annually at the ceremonial ground.
