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Bessie Russell weaves a basket in her home work room. Russell’s baskets made from natural and commercial reed sell mostly in Cherokee Nation gift shops, casinos and at the Cherokee Heritage Center in Tahlequah, Okla.

TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – At 70, Bessie Russell has acquired many artistic skills in her life: sewing, beading, crafting clay beads for jewelry, among others. But the one craft she always comes back to is the art of traditional Cherokee basket weaving.
“It came about after I was an adult,” she said. “I took some classes in the 70s from Thelma Forrest.”
Russell said she quit weaving baskets for a while to raise her children. She left the mostly Indian, Delaware County, rural community of Rocky Ford, where she grew up and moved away for 12 years. When she returned, she met Cherokee artist Mary Foreman. They became close friends, Foreman passing on to Russell her knowledge of Cherokee culture with each basket spoke and weave......

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