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A beautiful Navajo silver carinated “Bangle”-style bracelet by Fred Thompson, Gallup, NM, c.1940’s-50's

FRED THOMPSON (1921-2002) is considered to be one of the 20th century's premier Navajo silversmiths, renowned for his exceptionally well made, traditional silver work and his use of often quite large and unique stones of the very highest-quality. Thompson began his silversmithing career in 1936 at the tender age of 15, working for the prominent Gallup, New Mexico Indian trader, Tobe Turpen for whom he worked his entire career, taking a few years off to serve in World War Two. Thompson worked in a completely traditional Navajo manner, making all of his own stamps and tools, and he eventually achieved worldwide recognition for his bold and classic designs and outstanding craftsmanship.

But despite his completely traditional Navajo silversmith training and methods, Thompson also did have something of an artistic “Wild Hair” so to speak, which he expressed most interestingly in a somewhat Modernist design manner such as in the unique stamp worked designs he used on this bracelet. Like the bracelet’s sharply carinated silver shank, the stamped designs are angular, spare and elegant with a lot of room between them. Here, Fred Thompson is possibly getting some artistic design inspiration from his Native American jewelry contemporaries at the nearby Navajo Arts and Crafts Guild who also made their Revival-style Navajo silverwork with more spare and modernist design influences. Thompson himself might very possibly have also made some pieces for the Navajo Guild as well as it was fairly common practice at the time in the Gallup area for various Indian Traders to “lend” their in-house silversmiths to other trading operations and makers from time to time.

In any case, the bracelet is superbly designed and beautifully made. It is especially well-executed and very smoothly and finely finished; the craftsmanship is graceful and remarkable in every respect. The bangle-style bracelet measures 3/8” in width all the way around, the inner circumference end-to-end is between 5 1/8" and 5 3/16" and the gap between the terminals is just slightly over 1" for a total interior circumference of 6 1/8"+ to 6 3/16"+. The bracelet weighs

a very comfortable and easy to wear 37 grams or 1 1/4 ounces and it is in remarkably excellent original condition especially for its 70-80 or so years of age with some very small amount of normal age-appropriate wear. As can be

seen in the photo, the bracelet's terminals are very slightly misaligned, but this is of no particular consequence.

The bracelet is properly and distinctly signed on the inside of the silver shank with with Fred Thompson’s customary “Tilde” hallmark signature.

This unique bracelet is a splendid and handsome historic, yet quite Modernist-looking piece from the fertile creative mind and extremely talented hands of a distinguished Navajo artist whose pieces are held in increasingly and deservedly high regard and thus are naturally growing more and more difficult and costly to come by today.

To have this distinctive, rare piece come from Fred Thompson’s talented hands to yours is a great pleasure indeed,

one to which we can personally well attest.

Price $875

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Navajo Silversmith, Fred Thompson (1921-2002)

The Tobe Turpen Trading Post in Gallup, NM

where Fred Thompson worked his entire career.