Kirk Smith

My grandfather made jewelry and began teaching me in the 1960s. He kept his workshop away from the house and was very secretive about it. In a canyon away from their hogan he had dug out the earth, and then placed brush and tree limbs over the top. This his the workshop, and you would not see it unless you knew it was there.

At first I helped him with soldering. I would use the bellow used to heat the charcoal to a high tempature while my grandfather worked with the jewelry over the heat. After that I remember working with bracelets, beads, and necklaces.

I stayed with them until I was around 9 years old. Than I went to live with my Mother in Crownpoint.

I would make cast pieces for my Uncle Johnny. He would pay me by getting me clothes and shoes. I did this for about four years.

Around 1972 I went out on my own. Started making my first pieces and would sell to Gilbert Ortega. The work was all silver, and was sand cast work. However, when silver got high around1974 I stopped making jewelry and went to work for the mine. I did lots of different stuff, even worked for a refinery around Galveston. Did these different jobs for the rest of the 1970s.

My mother had gotten sick and I wanted to be around her.

My sister was married to Harry Morgan, and he really taught me how to design a piece. Before I never really paid much attention to the style, that changed because of Harry. He also had a big name and was well known, I wanted to be one of those people. My Grandfather told me, “when you leave something here you name will always be here”.

Now I try to give back to my people. I taught some of the Martinez family, Fred Brown, Dean Brown, and Anthony Skeet to name a few. Hoping that they can in return take care of their families. Our family meets every Saturday to see if we can get money together to help different families. People know that our family does this and they come to us with their problems. After that we see if we can raise the money they need. That is why we are thankful for the traders and tourist, because we get the majority of our money when we sell our jewelry.

I am more traditional, we do this by ourselves to help our people.

I will always change, more design in my pieces.