When the railroads arrived in the Southwest, the people who came in contact with them had an additional way of supporting themselves by utilizing their traditional skills and materials to make objects that they could sell. The Pima have a long heritage of fine basket making and thus the weavers began to make objects that could be easily transported by visitors back to their homes

This basket is one of a group of very fine, quality miniatures that have been in an Eastern collection. All are very tightly woven and shaped with skill that only an experienced weaver had. It is very difficult to weave very small, tightly coiled baskets out of materials that are relatively stiff. This group of Pima baskets represents baskets of high quality and relative rarity.

Be sure to notice how absolutely around the finished rim is on this basket. Please also notice that the basket is very tightly woven around the pin cushion. How does one coil with an awl and still weave the basket so finely and tight against the cushion?