On Friday, April 21, Mom was the first one at the Gallery. She usually has been for the past 40 years. She would unlock the building, get the lights on, fire up the computer, and get the Gallery ready for business.

Jeanette Dale and her husband Harry live on the Navajo Nation, about halfway between Gallup and Shiprock, off to the west of the highway near a beautiful rock formation. For about fifty years, she has been known to dealers in Indian jewelry as one of the best and least-known Navajo silversmiths.

Everybody loved Orville! He and his wife, Darlene, were always surrounded by visitors and customers at their booths.They made beautiful jewelry and always had time for everyone. They lived in Shiprock, where they started a gallery that was a must-stop on any buying trip for shops from North America and Europe.

Everyone is affected when prices go up. If you are an artist and the cost of paint and canvas rises, it will affect you. But not that much.

Jewelry from the Zuni Pueblo, south of Gallup, New Mexico, has always made up many of the “tourist” style earrings that were so popular in the 1960s and 1970s.

One of the most exciting things in this business occurs when people inherit stunning art, jewelry, pottery, and even Navajo rugs that have never been worn or displayed.

We received a bracelet this year from a woman whose relative had purchased it in the late '70s. It is by a man and woman silversmithing team from Zuni Pueblo named Wayne and Virginia Quam.

Yes, there is a day to recognize and celebrate Native American Heritage. It is the day after Thanksgiving. The month of November is Native American Heritage Month.

One of Albuquerque’s best-known dealers in Southwest Indian arts and crafts was Manny Goodman, who, along with his wife Ann, ran the Covered Wagon store on the south side of the Old Town Plaza in Albuquerque.

Native American artists made the original Southwestern Native Earrings with turquoise and shell beads that were often two or three inches long or more. The beads were strung on a cotton string put through a hole in the ear lobe. Both men and women wore these earrings, which are very similar to the works of current Santo Domingo artist Ray Lovato, except they hang by silver wires!

In the mid-1800s, Zuni metal smiths began fashioning jewelry out of copper. Much of it was for their own use, but as the tourists started to come to the Southwest in the late 1800s, much of it was sold in Gallup, the hub of the Native tourist trade.

How about that? According to a story in the Wall Street Journal, turquoise is having a jewelry resurgence! I did not realize it had gone out of style, but I guess that’s from living in the Desert Southwest!