George Guess, aka Sequoyah

Sequoyah (Ssiquoya, as he signed his name, or Se-quo-ya, as is often spelled in Cherokee; named in English George Gist or George Guess) (c.1770-1843), was an American and Cherokee polymath. In 1821 he completed his independent creation of a Cherokee syllabary, making reading and writing in Cherokee possible. This was one of the very few times in recorded history that a member of a pre-literate people created an original, effective writing system (another example being Shong Lue Yang). After seeing its worth, the people of the Cherokee Nation rapidly began to use his syllabary and officially adopted it in 1825.