Harvey Chavarria (1943-1991)

I happened to plug in my dad’s name into the internet search engine and your website popped up. The article was more about my mother, Debra Trujillo Duwyenie but on the bottom it mentioned that you had little information on Harvey Chavarria. Harvey is not my biological father but he’s been in my life since I was a baby and for that, I will always consider him my dad.

Harvey was born April 3, 1943 and passed away on June 8, 1991. It was a freak accident. He happened to be out in the field’s one Saturday morning farming and got under his tractor, the tractor then rolled over him, crushing him to death.

Harvey began collaborating pottery with my mother, Debra Trujillo, in the early 1980s all the way until his death, so they had a good 10 years or so working together. Harvey’s father was Juan Chavarria, who served as Governor in Santa Clara Pueblo for many years. His mother was Gregorita Chavarria, who passed away June 5, 2008 at the age of 102 years old! Gregorita also made pottery.

I believe Harvey had 9 siblings, 7 brothers and 2 sisters (who are all deceased except for one brother and one sister). I don’t think any of his siblings did pottery for a living, except his mother. Harvey’s living brother, Dave Chavarria makes flint knives with beaded pouches and decorative turkey feathers with baskets.

Five and half years after Harvey’s death, my mother married Preston Duwyenie. They began collaborating pottery together which are usually the smaller seed pots. Preston also makes pottery by himself but it’s usually the bigger pottery.

Well, I just wanted to be of help and give you what little information I have. It seems like you’ve been doing some research but haven’t found much. I hope this helps!

 

—Stephanie J. Wallace

 

 

 

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