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Cherokee Nation Tribal Council Member Don Garvin and Principal Chief Chad Smith shop with Cherokee Nation Angel Tree Kids at Wal-Mart.

TAHLEQUAH, OK - A generous donation to the Cherokee Nation’s Angel Tree Program provided Christmas presents for 110 Cherokee children this holiday season.

More than 30 of the children stormed through Wal-Mart Thursday afternoon, gathering toys, clothes and smiles along the way. Principal Chief Chad Smith, tribal council member Don Garvin, and staff from the Cherokee Nation’s Indian Child Welfare Department helped the kids with their selections.

"Some of the kids just wanted sleeping bags so they could be warm in their house at night," Smith said. "This gift meant a lot to each of these kids. Their smiles lit up the whole store."

The Cherokee Nation Angel Tree program helped hundreds of Cherokee children this Christmas. The money donated by Dr. Charles Rogers, and his son George, was meant specifically to buy presents for 110 Cherokee children in honor of the 110th anniversary of the death of their Cherokee ancestor, Mary Price.

"Our family has received precious gifts from our Cherokee ancestors and from other Cherokees," said Charles Rogers. "Some of them have passed on and some of them still live. My Cherokee great-grandmother, Mary Price, kept her children together with her dying request. She made them promise not to be broken up, but to grow up together.

"In honor of her great love for her children and all Cherokee children, we are giving a Christmas gift to these 110 needy Cherokee children," Rogers said. "It’s our way of saying thank you to my great-grandmother."