Entity Collection

: Chipeta; Chipeta. Chipeta or White Singing Bird (1843 or 1844–August 1924), was a Native American woman, and the second wife of Chief Ouray of the Uncompahgre Ute tribe. Born a Kiowa Apache, she was raised by the Utes in what is now Conejos, Colorado. According to oral history interviewee Glenn McFall, she was a repeat customer at the McConnell-Lowes shoe store in Grand Junction, where she would buy sturdy shoes for the girls that she had brought with her from the reservation. Apparently, she would come through town annually with a large group of Utes on their way to Montrose, and camp at the old Mesa County Fairgrounds (now Lincoln Park). According to McFall, Chipeta also visited other locales on the Western Slope, including the Baxter Pass area, where she arranged for a Mrs. Edison to teach some Ute girls how to bake bread. *Public domain photograph