First Turquoise Setting in Navajo Silver: Atsidi Chon and Grey Moustache

The first documented turquoise stone set in silver was placed by a Navajo smith named Atsidi Chon — Ugly Smith — in a ring, around 1878, as witnessed by Grey Moustache. Adair recorded the account directly and is careful to note that it is the first setting Grey Moustache knew of, not the absolute first in existence. What is certain: by this moment, Navajo silver acquired the stone that would define it for the next century and a half.

Mateo's Field Notes

Grey Moustache was there. He was learning silver from Atsidi Sani around 1878 when his brother-in-law Atsidi Chon set the first stone. He described it in his own words to John Adair: "Atsidi Chon was a very good silversmith … He was the first silversmith to set turquoise in silver. The first piece that he set was in a ring. That was at the time when I was learning how to make silver from Atsidi Sani [c. 1878]. This ring had just one stone in it … I remember when this ring was finished, many Navajo gathered around to see it, and all of them thought that it was very pretty." (Adair 1944, p. 8–9)

Adair appended an important qualification: "Although Grey Moustache said that Atsidi Chon was the first smith to set turquoise in silver, his testimony cannot be taken as conclusive evidence. It would be more accurate to say that he was the first one to set turquoise in silver as far as Grey Moustache knew." (Adair 1944, p. 13) The Navajo Nation in 1878 was large, travel was slow, and silversmithing was spreading faster than any observer could fully track. Bedinger notes at least one other candidate — Slender-Maker-of-Silver — as a possible claimant to the first turquoise setting, without resolving the question. (Bedinger 1973, ~p. 18–19)

Atsidi Chon was not only the first to set stone — he was the smith who carried Navajo silversmithing to the Zuni. Around 1870, he traveled to Zuni Pueblo, lived with a Zuni man named Lanyade, and taught the techniques there. (Adair 1944, ~p. 9; Bedinger 1973, ~p. 18–19) Grey Moustache told Adair directly of Atsidi Chon's Zuni expedition, placing the date around 1870. This single journey set the stage for Zuni silver and inlay work to develop as a parallel tradition within a generation.

Grey Moustache's own contribution to the turquoise era was practical: he found a vein of soft pumiceous casting stone near Sunrise Springs, Arizona, around 1898, and shared it with Atsidi Chon. "My brother-in-law, Atsidi Chon, saw this stone, and he asked me where I got it. I told him and he went over to that same place and got some for himself. After that time we always used that stone for our molds." (Adair 1944, p. 8–9) Better casting stone enabled better bezel work. One discovery enabled the next.

By the early 1880s, turquoise was beginning its slow rise from occasional accent to defining feature of Navajo and Zuni jewelry. The first concho belt at Fort Defiance (1868–69) was silver without stone. Within a decade, that was changing. The form that collectors now associate most with Southwest silver — large turquoise cabochon in a hand-worked silver bezel — took shape across the 1880s and 1890s as smiths learned where to source good stone and how to set it securely.

Related Entries

Biography of Atsidi Chon, the smith who set the first turquoise stone and introduced silversmithing to Zuni. For the eyewitness account: Grey Moustache. For origins context: Origins of Navajo Silversmithing. For the trading post economy that spread the turquoise market: Trading Post Era.