AUTHOR GIVES `MESSAGE' FROM TRAIL OF TEARS

Her creative spirit embarked on a lengthy trail long before her legs could carry her 1,100 miles.

"I remember hearing stories from my mother, Mary Katherine Kirk, about the Cherokee Indian and the Trail of Tears walk that was made by my ancestors in 1838," said Alethea Adams-Wells, brushing back jet-black hair over her shoulder.

Born with three-quarters Cherokee and one-quarter Irish blood, Wells began to develop a lifelong goal of doing something to honor her ancestors.

She became the first woman to trace the same Trail of Tears route in 1993 at the age of 40. The experiences along the way, mixed with memories of her childhood, became the genesis of her first novel: "Message In The Wind."

"My mind was always creative since my legs left me sitting alone," said Wells, who is now 43. "This is when I found myself listening to the wind-messages, painting on rocks and writing poems in the dirt."

It wasn't until she was 12 that she discovered that not every child was born with enough talent that would one day lead to a published novel or purchased painting.

"I thought every child was given this gift from the maker of breath," Wells, adding that she draws her strength from God, the maker of breath.

Once Wells received vaccine for polio, she began a dream that would ultimately lead to her greatest literary endeavor to date.

"I had to scoot along the ground and on the kitchen floor because polio kept me from walking," she said. "I tugged on my mother's dress and told her I heard the message in the wind. I knew I would write the story about my people and myself one day, but I didn't know when."

Vicki Skaggs, who is Wells' agent and friend, helped make the biographical account happen. "I first met her in the mountains in Pikeville, Ky., in 1988," Skaggs said. "She was so reclusive, it took me two years just to get her to go to the store in town. "I'm glad I met her because she has so many manuscripts already written. There are plenty of good stories that need to be told."

Skaggs and Wells are already planning a second book called "Gap In The Trail." "Vicki will take all of the pictures of the trail I walked and I'll put the words in," Wells said.

Wells had to write her first book by hand and then type it on a computer. "I'm dyslexic, so I have to write everything out by hand the first time," she said. "In a sense I guess I wrote this one backward and forward but it was important to get on paper."

The message of Wells' first novel is to be proud of your heritage and to take advantage of any opportunity to gain an education. "Two things people can't ever take from me is my heritage and what I've learned," Wells said.

She began her arduous 1,100-mile trek by foot Sept. 3, 1993, in Rattlesnake Springs, Tenn. The journey, symbolic of the 1883 Cherokee exile in which her ancestors were evicted from their land when gold was discovered on it, ended in Tahlequah, Okla., Jan. 5, 1993.

Armed with a 42-pound backpack, tent, Buck knife in a scabbard and a gun nicknamed "Bonnie," Wells was ready for "anything possible around every turn in the road."

"I met some very good people, but I also met some that would have attacked me and left me for dead if I hadn't threatened to shoot them with Bonnie," she said.

A couple who befriended her near Nashville, Tenn., nursed her out of a flu-like condition. "They took me in and helped me," she said.

"This book is about looking at who you are and making the most out of your life," she said. "I've been lucky enough to have that happen to me; now I want to give that back to others."

Wells will be at the Cape Girardeau Public Library on Thursday, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. for a book-signing session. On Friday, she will be at Trail of Tears Park in the visitor's building from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and at the West Park Mall in the main entrance from 5 to 7 p.m. There will be a book-signing session at Wal-Mart on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.