Born as an enslaved person in St. Louis, Missouri, Cheatham was freed at the age of eight by the Emancipation Proclamation, and then moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, with his family shortly thereafter.

[7] In 1907, Cheatham and two other Black firefighters, Lafayette Mason and Frank Harris, were assigned to be in charge of Fire Station 24 at Hiawatha Avenue and 45th Street, a racially segregated facility that officials were transitioning to an all-Black firehouse.

[2][8] The station was in middle of a redlined neighborhood that was predominantly White, but it was also adjacent to a railroad yard where many Black labors worked.

[6] After debate by Minneapolis city councilors and support via a petition from White women who lived in the area, the fire station continued with the assignment of Black firefighters.

Cheatham was buried at the Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery in Minneapolis alongside other family members.

[12] The city's fire department was not racially integrated again until 1972 after being ordered to do so by federal judge Earl Larson.

[13] The city sold Fire Station 24 after its closure and it was used by a variety of private industrial businesses.

[12] In the aftermath of protests following George Floyd's murder in 2020, honoring Cheatham's legacy was part of a wave of statue removals and official re-designations.

[2] In 2021, a petition drive led by disability activist Noah McCourt requested that the City of Minneapolis rename Dight Avenue, a street in the Longfellow community that had been named decades earlier for Charles Fremont Dight for his efforts to promote food safety, but who also advocated for eugenics.