Susan Gathers was kicked back in the student union one afternoon, her thumbs poised over her smart phone, simultaneously bantering with friends while texting — sometimes even texting the same person she was talking to.

This impressive skill to seamlessly dialogue in multiple mediums at once is nothing new for “Generation Next-ers” like Gathers. But unlike the typical truncated words and vowel-less abbreviations that permeate normal text-speak, her screen was filled with Cherokee syllables as she pushed send.

Ghosts, spirits, swamp gas, gnomes and car headlights — there’s no shortage of hyphotheses behind the mysterious phenomenon along the Blue Ridge Parkway. The real question is, though, have you seen the light?

“If at first you don’t succeed, simply make your case again” is the lesson the executives at the tribally owned Sequoyah National Golf Course learned earlier this month.

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians has been propping up the golf course financially to the tune of about $1.1 million annually since it first opened in 2009. But tribal council signaled last year they wanted to scale back and eventually end the subsidies.

Despite being warned not to return to Cherokee without tribal permission, animal rights activists gathered once again last Saturday in front of Chief Saunooke Bear Park waving signs and even donning a bear costume to protest the allegedly inhumane condition of the bear pits.

When pediatricians at Cherokee Indian Hospital retreat to their desk between patients to log data, research puzzling symptoms or review lab results, they’re constantly looking over their shoulders.

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians is hitting domestic violence abusers in their pocketbooks.

People convicted of domestic violence-related charges must now pay a $1,000 fine, in addition to other penalties handed down by tribal court. Tribal council approved of the measure at its meeting last week.

It’s all started with a phone call.

A lifelong thirst for adventure led Ronald R. Cooper to a love of backpacking, where he soon began hiking around the Grand Canyon and beyond. But, he was in search of a new challenge, one that ultimately tied together his Native American ancestry with his own modern existence.

Swain County’s oversized jail will lose about one-third of its current inmate population and a sizeable revenue stream when the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians opens a new justice center, complete with its own jail.

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians was accidentally overbilled $2.7 million for IT service over several years by the company that manages Harrah’s Casino.

Twice a year, Dorothy Posey arrives for her job at Mountain Credit Union in Cherokee knowing one thing: the lines will be long.

Not the sort of long by normal bank standards, like the 10-person-deep line that might form during the peak of Friday afternoon payday traffic. But so long that the line from the teller’s counter will snake out the credit union’s front door and continue to pile up outside.