Native Saints: The Washakie Ward is a digital history resource that tells the story of the Washakie Ward, a Northwestern Shoshone congregation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that operated between 1880 and 1966. The project is a collaboration between the Church History Department (CHD) and The Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation (NWBSN). Led by NWBSN History and Culture Specialist Patty Timbimboo-Madsen, a team including Vice Chairman Bradley Parry, Cultural Resource Specialist Rios Pacheco, former tribal chair Gwen Timbimboo-Davis, and other tribal Elders has worked closely with CHD historians David W. Grua, Jeffrey D. Mahas, and Joshua Rust to conceptualize this project and ensure that the stories of Washakie have been told in a manner that is accurate and consistent with NWBSN traditions and protocols.[1]

The Washakie Ward had its origins in the early 1870s, as Shoshone bands from Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, and Nevada struggled to survive Euro-American migrant and settler incursions within the Shoshone debia’, or homeland. As United States officials pressured Natives in the Great Basin and Mountain West to remove to reservations, some Shoshone reportedly experienced dreams and visions—what they would have understood in terms of bo’ha, or spiritual power—that convinced them that affiliating with the Latter-day Saint settlers and adopting Euro-American sedentary agriculture would be the most viable path toward cultural survival within their debia’. During the mid-1870s, nearly one thousand Shoshone and Bannock people accepted Latter-day Saint baptism. In 1880, a core group of about two hundred Shoshone Saints established Washakie, a vibrant farming village and Indigenous congregation four miles south of the Utah-Idaho border.[2]

The Shoshone learned to be Latter-day Saints in the Washakie Ward. In a small meetinghouse constructed by Shoshone labor, they sat in sacrament meetings where they heard Shoshone preachers expound Latter-day Saint teachings, they participated in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, and they listened to a Shoshone choir sing in their own language. They participated in Sunday School classes and meetings of Relief Society, priesthood, and youth organizations, offering prayers, giving lessons, and making comments. They learned about the Book of Mormon and that Euro-Americans viewed Native Americans as descendants of an ancient Israelite people known as the Lamanites, with both positive and negative stereotypes attached to that identity.[3] In the late 1870s and early 1880s, the Washakie Shoshone helped build the Logan Temple,  where they performed sacred ordinances for themselves and their deceased ancestors. Although Euro-American missionaries and their families initially filled leadership positions, over time ward members—such as “Bishop” John Moemberg (Ech-up-wy), the principal Shoshone leader of the community in the late 1870s and early 1880s who presided in meetings when Euro-American missionaries were absent; Cohn Shoshonitz Zundel, the daughter of Bear River Massacre survivors who was the first Shoshone woman called as a counselor in the Relief Society presidency; and Yeager Timbimboo, a massacre survivor himself who became the first Shoshone called as a counselor in the ward bishopric—indigenized the congregation.[4]

It was in the Washakie Ward that they taught their children and grandchildren what it meant to be Latter-day Saints proud of their Shoshone heritage. Although Euro-American Latter-day Saints shared many racial and assimilationist assumptions of the broader society, the indigenized space of the Washakie Ward encouraged the survival of Shoshone language, culture, and values. Well into the twentieth century, ward members worshipped on Sundays using the Shoshone language, community members practiced traditional medicine, and grandparents taught their grandchildren the stories of their people during the winters, the traditional time for sharing such stories.[5]

Unfortunately, changes in farming technology, the Great Depression, and World War II forced many Shoshone Saints to leave Washakie in pursuit of better employment. Euro-American church leaders viewed this outmigration as evidence that Washakie had fulfilled its purpose, as the Shoshone residents had tools to survive in the broader society. Believing incorrectly that the Shoshone Saints’ dispersal meant they had permanently abandoned Washakie, church leaders closed the congregation in 1966 and prepared the land for sale. Acting under the direction of local leaders, farm employees evicted remaining residents and burned homes believed to be abandoned. However, even those Northwestern Shoshone who had left to find higher-paying employment elsewhere believed that the church had given them Washakie as their perpetual home. For many Washakie Ward members and their descendants, the closure of the unit and the sale of the property caused a traumatic rupture with the church that has never fully healed. Other ward members, though confused and hurt by the church’s actions, nevertheless continued to worship and serve in Latter-day Saint congregations elsewhere. Despite these challenges, they retained their identity as Shoshone people. In 1974, as a form of compensation, the church donated 184 acres in Box Elder County to the Northwestern Shoshone, and the federal government in turn designated the property as trust land. This qualified the tribe for government aid. In addition, in 1987 the tribe adopted a constitution under the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 as the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation.[6]

As a digital history offering of the Church Historian’s Press, Native Saints: The Washakie Ward sheds light on the history of the congregation and its members. Historical essays narrate the history of the Northwestern Shoshone and their acceptance of and experiences with the Latter-day Saint faith, while biographies detail the lives of key women and men who made Washakie their physical and spiritual home between 1880 and 1966. The resource also provides maps, photographs, documents, a chronology, and a guide to Church History Library collections pertaining to the Washakie Ward.

Native Saints: The Washakie Ward also features a digital database—hosted by the Church History Biographical Database—of more than 1,600 Shoshone men, women, and children who either accepted Latter-day Saint baptism or were children who died before they could be baptized. The names appear in nineteenth-century missionary journals, letters, and reports as well as more than twenty-five Washakie Ward record books housed at the Church History Library. Project missionaries and staff at the Church History Library have meticulously indexed these records by person, compiling not only vital data such as parents’ names, birthdates and places, spouse’s names, and death dates and places, but also baptismal and other ordinance information. In addition, the indexing included church participation in the form of prayers given, talks delivered, comments made, musical numbers performed, and activities associated with leadership and other callings.[7]

The project therefore seeks to illuminate the stories of Washakie Ward members such as Yeager Timbimboo, a Bear River Massacre survivor, Northwestern Shoshone Latter-day Saint, and longtime counselor in the Washakie Ward bishopric. Yeager represented his religious community when he stood at the pulpit of the Salt Lake Tabernacle during the church’s Ninety-sixth Annual Conference on 6 April 1926. Through an interpreter Timbimboo recalled, “In my childhood I understood nothing of the services of this people. I had seen them going to Church. Not until I yielded obedience unto the word of God and accepted the ordinances of the gospel did I know what they were doing.”[8] Speaking at conference marked more than a half century since Timbimboo and his people had responded to their bo’ha visions and embraced the restored gospel. Native Saints: The Washakie Ward seeks to honor the legacy of Yeager Timbimboo and other Northwestern Shoshone Latter-day Saints.

Indigenous people often use multiple names during their lifetimes: a Native name given to them as an infant as well as one or more Native names used as an adult. As Natives interacted more frequently with Euro-Americans, they often received an English or scriptural name. When Native Latter-day Saints began using given names and surnames in the 1870s and 1880s, they sometimes used Native appellations for both names, such as Sagwitch Timbimboo. Others adopted an English name as their given name and retained their adult Native name as a surname, like Alma Shoshonitz. In Native Saints biographies, the final adult name is treated as the standardized name. The biographies use the names that were in use at different points in the individuals’ lives—as documented in available evidence—narrating the gradual adoption of additional names until they settled on their standardized name. At that point, they are most often referred to by their standardized given name. In biographies, women are listed under their combined birth and married surnames.

The Native Saints project employs preferred tribal names and spellings, such as Shoshone, when referring to Natives from a specific nation. In consultation with Northwestern Shoshone Elders, the project utilizes the singular Shoshone rather than the plural Shoshones. The project also uses cultural and linguistic terms such as Newe (meaning “the people”) and Numic (referring to a language family) when referring to the broader Shoshone nation.[9] 

When describing Natives generally, Native Saints employs Native and Indigenous as nouns and as adjectives. The project avoids using Indian, American Indian, and Lamanite, except when describing historical beliefs, quoting historical documents, or referring to Euro-American policies, institutions (e.g. the “Indian Office”), and officials (e.g., the “Indian Agent”).[10]

CHURCH HISTORY DEPARTMENT

Historians

David W. Grua, Lead Historian

Jeffrey D. Mahas

Joshua S. Rust

Christopher Bowman Rich Jr.

Jerry Winder

Jason Charlie Young

Brent M. Rogers, Historian Manager

Editorial Staff

Catherine Reese Newton, Lead Editor

McKinsey Kemeny

Emma Taylor

Samuel Lambert

Keaton Reed

Kaytee Johnson

Hannah Lenning

Petra Javadi-Evans, Editorial Manager

NORTHWESTERN BAND OF THE SHOSHONE NATION

Patty Timbimboo-Madsen, History and Culture Specialist

Rios Pacheco, Cultural Resources Specialist

Bradley Parry, Vice Chairman

George Gover, Executive Director (retired)

Gwen Timbimboo Davis, former Tribal Chairwoman

Maria Moncur, Communications and PR Director

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