Turquoise Mountain Turquoise (Mohave County): The Hill Once Called Aztec Mountain
Part of the Turquoise Mines field guides and The Southwest Jewelry Guide.
There is more than one Turquoise Mountain, and that is the first thing to know about the name. This page is about the one in Mohave County, Arizona: a hill in the Cerbat Mountains near Kingman that the old surveys called Aztec Mountain. Its turquoise is sold under its own name and under Kingman’s, and our books split on which is right.
Which Turquoise Mountain?
Lowry calls it “probably the most common name given to a turquoise-bearing hillside.” [1] He places one near Kingman, one near Gleeson in southern Arizona, and one in Baja California. [1] Kunz’s 1890 list kept the two Arizona sites apart: “Turquoise Mountain, Cochise County, Ariz.; Mineral Park, Mohave County, Ariz.” [2] In that list, the Turquoise Mountain is the Cochise one, and the Mohave site goes by the name Mineral Park.
Our other pages cover other hills that carry the name:
- Courtland: the Cochise County Turquoise Mountain, near Gleeson and Tombstone.
- Hachita: Grant County, New Mexico.
- Halloran Springs: San Bernardino County, California.
If a piece is labelled “Turquoise Mountain” with no county, the label hasn’t told you which of these it means.
Aztec Mountain
The Mohave hill had an older name. Pogue, in 1915, listed the turquoise localities of Mineral Park on the western side of the Cerbat range, among them “Aztec Mountain, 1 mile south of Ithaca Peak.” In a footnote he pointed to a later Kunz text, an 1898–99 report for the U.S. Geological Survey, not the 1890 book: “The Turquois Mountain of this locality described by Kunz … is identical with Aztec Mountain.” [3] So, as Pogue reads him, Kunz used the name for both hills: for Cochise in 1890, and for the Mohave hill by the late 1890s.
Lowry, in 2010, gives the two main turquoise areas of the Cerbat Mountains as “Aztec Peak (Turquoise Mountain) and Ithaca Peak.” [1] Chambless and Ryan, retelling the prospector James Haas’s story, have him come upon old mines “in an area called Aztec Mountain (aka Turquoise Mountain).” [4]
The workings there are old. Pogue reported prehistoric pits and tunnels on the hill’s southern side. [3] In Haas’s telling, the old mines had been worked by soldiers from nearby Fort Mohave, and “ancient stone hammers” lay over the ground and dumps. [4] The company years that followed, from Haas to the Aztec Turquoise Company, are told in full on our Kingman page.
Its own mine, or Kingman?
Two of our sources give two answers, and we print both.
Lowry treats it as its own. In 2002 he wrote that although Turquoise Mountain “is located near the Kingman deposits, it is considered a classic mine in its own right because its turquoise is so different in appearance.” [5] In 2010 he wrote that the hill’s distinctive look “has been marketed separately from the Kingman blue colors” of turquoise from nearby Ithaca Peak. [1]
Chambless and Ryan fold it in. As of 2021 they wrote that turquoise from the old Mineral Park district “is today commonly referred to as Kingman, although distinction has been made for both Ithaca Peak and Turquoise Mountain.” [4] And: “All of the turquoise from Ithaca Peak, Turquoise Mountain, and Kingman comes from the area of Mineral Park.” [4]
On one point they agree. The same ground has been sold under three names. Lowry: “Turquoise from this area has been marketed using the names Kingman, Ithaca Peak, and Turquoise Mountain.” [1] So a stone sold as Kingman may have come off this hill, and a Mohave County stone sold as Turquoise Mountain came from the same district as Kingman.
What the stone looks like
Blue and green, in both accounts. Lowry describes “distinctive stones with unique blue and green colors.” [5] Haas found “pieces of blue and green stones” on the old dumps. [4]
Lowry adds, and it is his description alone, that the hill’s “blue and green vein and nugget formations” generally polish into “a beautiful spiderweb matrix.” [1] He also records that its stone “has also been sold as Old Man Turquoise.” [5]
Natural, stabilized, enhanced
The name says nothing about treatment. Our books picture stone sold as Turquoise Mountain three ways:
- labelled “stabilized” in a gallery in Ryan and Chambless’s Part Two, under the heading “Kingman – Ithaca Peak – Turquoise Mountain”; [6]
- “enhanced” in a Schiffer caption; [7]
- “natural” in a gold piece by Perry Shorty pictured by Bassman. [8]
These are three single pieces, not a rule about the mine. Only the Part Two gallery places its piece in the Kingman district; the other two captions don’t say which Turquoise Mountain, and Schiffer’s doesn’t say what the enhancement was. Ask what was done to the stone, every time.
What the record doesn’t hold
None of our books says who owns or works the hill today, or what share of its stone is treated. None tells you how to tell Turquoise Mountain from Ithaca Peak by eye; Lowry’s “different in appearance” is as far as any of them goes.
Field Notes by Mateo James
Three names for one hill is not confusion. It’s commerce. Aztec Mountain is the name in Pogue’s 1915 study, Turquoise Mountain is the one that stuck, and Kingman is the one the market reaches for, because buyers already know it. The stone doesn’t change when the tag does. Read the tag as a claim about ground, made by whoever sold the piece. If it says Turquoise Mountain, ask which county. If it says Mohave, ask what was done to it. The blue-green belongs to the hill; the treatment belongs to the seller.
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How this page is sourced. We strive for accuracy: every factual statement above is quoted from or credited to the printed work listed below, with page numbers, and this page is continuously updated with new information as we read more of our library. Printed works are cited by page and describe conditions as of their dates. Where our books disagree, we show each one and say whose claim it is. If you know better, contact us.
Sources
- Lowry, Joe Dan, and Joe P. Lowry. Turquoise: The World Story of a Fascinating Gemstone. Layton, UT: Gibbs Smith, 2010, pp. 218, 227, 244. Statements describe conditions as of 2010.
- Kunz, George F. Gems and Precious Stones of North America. New York: The Scientific Publishing Company, 1890, p. 54. Public domain.
- Pogue, Joseph E. The Turquois. Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. XII, Part II, Third Memoir. Washington, 1915, pp. 45–46. Public domain. Statements describe conditions as of 1915.
- Chambless, Philip, and Mike Ryan II. Turquoise in America, Part One: The Great American Turquoise Rush, 1890–1910. Revised first edition. Callais Press, 2021, pp. 130, 131, 143. Statements describe conditions as of 2021.
- Lowry, Joe Dan, and Joe P. Lowry. Turquoise Unearthed: An Illustrated Guide. Photography by Mark Nohl. Tucson, AZ: Rio Nuevo Publishers, 2002, p. 64. Statements describe conditions as of 2002.
- Ryan, Mike, II, and Philip Chambless. Turquoise in America, Part Two: 1910–1990. Callais Press, 2020, p. 292.
- Schiffer, Nancy N. Turquoise Jewelry. Revised 4th ed. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Publishing, 2008, p. 44.
- Bassman, Theda. The Beauty of Navajo Jewelry. Photography by Gene Balzer. Walnut, California: Kiva Publishing, 1997, p. 38.