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Native SaintsNative Saints

    James Martin Pabawena
    (ca. 1878–1967)

    James Martin Pabawena was a Western Shoshone leader, a student at Carlisle Indian Industrial School, and a convert member of the Washakie Ward. He was born 31 August 1878 in Starr Valley, Nevada, to father Thomas Pabawena Sr. and mother Jane (Ho-tim-a-sow-wop).1 Little is known about James’s early years. When he was a child, his parents moved from eastern Nevada to northern Utah Territory, where many Western Shoshone had joined the Northwestern Shoshone Latter-day Saint community at Washakie.2 According to his obituary, James grew up at Washakie with his family, but there are reasons to believe that he spent some of his childhood in Elko, Nevada, with Jennie Martin’s family, from whom he presumably derived his middle name.3 Washakie Ward records for the 1880s and 1890s are scarce, and there is no indication that he was baptized as a Latter-day Saint in his childhood or youth.

    On 17 December 1900, James was admitted to Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.4 Carlisle was one of the earliest Indigenous boarding schools and acted as a blueprint for similar schools across the nation that sought to assimilate young Native Americans into white American society, often through cultural suppression and strict religious education. There would have been considerable pressure during his time at the school for James to join a mainstream Christian faith, given the perceived connection between Christianity and Euro-American “civilization.”5 Evidence indicates he was a practicing Presbyterian at Carlisle, where he was lauded for his “very good” conduct. James began with a second-grade education; by the time he left on 28 June 1906, he had a fifth-grade education and had become an “excellent” farmer and a “beginner” blacksmith. Correspondence in his student file indicates that he had fond memories of his time at what he called “dear old Carlisle.”6

    After returning home from Carlisle, James married Bessie Charley on 16 September 1907. They had two children who died shortly after birth in Starr Valley. Some evidence indicates the couple had another child, Lydia, who also may have been born while they resided in Nevada.7 James prospected for one year and worked as a laborer for local white farmers.8 He petitioned the local Indian Office agent, C. H. Asbury, for land at Brush Creek, Nevada. In his letter he boldly proclaimed:

    “But we wishes like to have our own land and able to handling the plow handle so far. should be the rights of all American Indians who had prior possession the soil. But I am one of the owners of the American soil and asking from you for my own benefit or for my folks. Because my fore fathers was not a foreigners like the whites are now. God created the heaven and the Earth and also created my great grandfather. I was created here on this American soil.”

    This is one of many documented instances of the fight for Native rights that characterized James’s life.9

    James decided to live closer to his family in Utah in 1913 and moved to farmland he and his family had acquired near Washakie in 1911. On his farm near Washakie, James raised horses, cattle, and chickens on 200 acres of land.10 Throughout his life, James and his brothers Thomas (1883–1950), John Spencer (1880–1961), and David (1892–1969) tended the farm and traveled the Intermountain West as laborers, thinning sugar beets and fencing.11

    James and Bessie participated minimally in the Washakie Ward before 1927.12 In a letter to Carlisle representatives, James stated that he was “attending to Sunday school and church” but it is unclear where he attended from 1913 to 1927.13 On 29 January 1927, James and Bessie were baptized by Moroni Timbimboo, and Washakie journalist Willie Ottogary recorded: “Mr. James Pabawena and wife was been [made] member of church. They was received a baptism last Saturday afternoon, and become the member Church of Christ latter day saints.”14 It was evidently a moment many in the community had been anticipating.

    Just a month after his baptism, James was ordained a deacon and called as a ward teacher, charged with visiting members of the ward and addressing their needs.15 He apparently fulfilled his duties well and was called as deacons quorum president on 1 April 1928.16 Each year, James received a new calling as he continued to grow into his role as a church member. He became chair of the amusement committee and then second assistant in the Sunday School, charged with overseeing religious education in the ward.17 Shortly after his ordination as elder in February 1930, he became a home missionary alongside Washakie Ward stalwarts Nephi Perdash, George Parago Sam, and Linford Neaman.18 During this mission, he preached to the congregation on subjects like the commandments, the Word of Wisdom, and tithing.19

    James also attended general conference in Salt Lake City with his wife and brothers and bore his testimony on the experience afterward.20 By 1934, James and Bessie had become staunch members of the Washakie Ward and decided to receive their endowments and solemnize their marriage in the Logan Temple.21 A year later, they were also sealed to the children they had lost while in Nevada.22

    James’s advocacy for Indigenous land and rights continued when he moved to Washakie. In 1917, he accompanied other Shoshone leaders to Washington DC to meet with the United States government and to air tribal grievances.23 James also traveled frequently closer to home in the Intermountain West, attending protests and acting as a voice for Indigenous communities. He participated in protests against the Nevada Poll Tax in May 1926 and, just a few months later, acted as spokesman for a group of Washakie leaders in Ogden.24 Time and again, he reaffirmed tribal sovereignty and claims to the land: “We claim all this county, even the land on which Ogden is situated. . . . Our people roamed over all this territory. They camped on the site of Ogden before the white man know there was a country like this.”25

    Around 1935, during the Great Depression, James and many of the Pabawenas moved to Elko while maintaining a residence near Washakie.26 They continued to visit Washakie regularly but stayed in Nevada until at least 1942.27 During his return to Nevada, James led a protest against the Civilian Conservation Corps’s actions near the Western Shoshone reservation in 1939.28 The opportunity created by wartime industries during World War II facilitated another move back to Washakie for James and his extended family sometime after 1942.29 James and his brothers lived in canvas tents near the Washakie townsite and commuted to work at a naval base in Clearfield, Utah.30

    James spent the last years of his life residing in Garland, Utah, and Bannock Creek, Idaho.31 In 1950, at the age of seventy-two, he was listed as vice chair of the Northwestern Shoshone under Chester Ottogary.32 He attended the Bannock Creek Branch on the Fort Hall Reservation with his wife and nephew Ben Benson (1926–2001), whom he evidently raised on behalf of his brother Thomas Pabawena Jr.33 James died in Bannock Creek on 27 August 1967 and was buried at the Washakie cemetery four days later.34

    Cite this page

    James Martin Pabawena(ca. 1878–1967), Native Saints, accessed May 28, 2026 https://www.churchhistorianspress.org/native-saints/biographies/james-martin-pabawena

      Footnotes

      1. [1]Records commonly place James’s birth from 1878 to 1880. (Nevada Selective Service System Registration Cards, 1877–97, DGS 4672613, no. 510, 31 Aug. 1878, familysearch.org; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 160, Record of Members Collection, 1836–1970, Church History Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City [Church History Library hereafter cited as CHL]; “James Martin Pabawena,” “Thomas Pabawena Sr.,” and “Jane Pabawena,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.)

      2. [2]James’s brother Thomas J. Pabawena Jr. was born in Washakie in 1883 when James would have been about five years old. (Helen Pubigee Timbimboo, interview by Alicia Martinez and Rios Pacheco, 5 Jan. 2012, transcript, p. 16, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 158, Record of Members Collection, CHL; “Thomas Pabawena Jr.,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.)

      3. [3]After arriving at Carlisle in 1900, he listed both his mother at Washakie and a Jennie Martin of Elko as his home addresses. When he finished his schooling, he returned to Nevada for a few years before moving to Washakie. (“James M. Pabowena,” Idaho State Journal (Pocatello), 29 Aug. 1967, 2; “Carlisle Indian Industrial School Descriptive and Historical Record of Student,” in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu.

      4. [4]James Pabawenah Student Information Card, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu.

      5. [5]David Wallace Adams, Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875–1928, 2nd ed. (University Press of Kansas, 2020), 28; “The Washakie Ward.”

      6. [6]“Carlisle Indian Industrial School Descriptive and Historical Record of Student,” in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu; “Record of Graduates and Returned Students, U.S. Indian School, Carlisle, PA,” in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu.

      7. [7]“Record of Graduates and Returned Students, U.S. Indian School, Carlisle, PA,” in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu; “James M. Pabowena,” 2; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 198, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Logan Temple Sealing of Children to Parents, 1884–1943, microfilm 178104, vol. N.S. M, p. 452, 28 Feb. 1935, FamilySearch Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City (FamilySearch Library hereafter cited as FSL); 1920 U.S. Census, Elwood Precinct, Box Elder Co., UT, enumeration dist. 11, p. 22A; “Bessie Charley,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      8. [8]“Record of Graduates and Returned Students, U.S. Indian School, Carlisle, PA,” in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu.

      9. [9]James Martin Pabawena to C. H. Asbury, 25 Mar. 1915, in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu.

      10. [10]In a report to the Department of the Interior, he stated he was in Elko in January 1913 “among my tribe,” the Western Shoshone. In the next report, he indicated that he had relocated to Washakie as of 28 December 1913. (James Martin Pabawena to Moses Friedman, 1 Jan. 1913, in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu; James Martin Pabawena to Moses Friedman, 28 Dec. 1913, in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu; “Record of Graduates and Returned Students, U.S. Indian School, Carlisle, PA,” in James Pabawenah Student File, Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center, carlisleindian.dickinson.edu.)

      11. [11]Matthew E. Kreitzer, ed., The Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary: Northwestern Shoshone Journalist and Leader, 1906–1929 (Utah State University Press, 2000), 114, 161; biography of Thomas Pabawena Jr.; “John Spencer Pabawena Sr.” and “David Pabawena,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      12. [12]James paid tithing a few times in 1914, perhaps seeing them as general donations to his family’s church. Both James and Bessie donated to tithing and fast offering funds in 1921 and James continued to donate from 1922 to 1927. (Historian’s Office Local Unit Financial Records, 1844–1963, Washakie Ward, Malad Stake, 1904–15, p. 135, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, 1902–33, 1943–62, vol. 6, p. 76, 23 Jan. 1921, CHL; Historian's Office Local Unit Financial Records, Washakie Ward, Malad Stake, 1903–29, pp. 280–81, CHL.)

      13. [13]Pabawena to Friedman, 28 Dec. 1913.

      14. [14]Washakie Branch, part 2, image 284, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 201; biographies of Moroni Timbimboo and Willie Ottogary.

      15. [15]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 7, 24 Feb. 1927, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 2, image 285, Record of Members Collection, CHL; see also William G. Hartley, “‘Brethren, It’s the Last Day of the Month’: A History of Ward Teaching, 1912–1963,” Journal of Mormon History 44, no. 4 (Oct. 2018): 90–111.

      16. [16]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 4, image 130, 1 Apr. 1928, CHL.

      17. [17]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 4, image 187, 22 Jan. 1929, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 279, Record of Members Collection, CHL.

      18. [18]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 198, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Washakie Ward Historical Record and Minutes, 1930, image 1, CHL; “Washakie News,” Bear River Valley Leader (Tremonton, UT), 8 Jan. 1931, 5; biographies of Nephi Perdash and George Parago Sam; “Linford Neaman,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      19. [19]Washakie Ward Historical Record and Minutes, 1930, image 7, CHL.

      20. [20]Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 187; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 8, p. 59, 17 Apr. 1932, CHL.

      21. [21]Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178054, vol. A, p. 788, 13 Dec. 1934, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings of Living Couples, 1884–1957, DGS 7225868, 13 Dec. 1934, FSL

      22. [22]Logan Temple Sealings of Children to Parents, 1884–1943, microfilm 178104, vol. N.S. M, p. 452, 28 Feb. 1935, FSL. There is no evidence that they were sealed to Lydia. This could mean that she was still living in 1934 and did not desire a sealing.

      23. [23]Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 6.

      24. [24]“Local News,” Journal (Logan, UT), 24 May 1926, 3; Frank Francis, “News Views,” Ogden (UT) Standard-Examiner, 13 June 1926, 1.

      25. [25]Francis, “News Views,” 1.

      26. [26]Utah Church Census Records, 1914–60, DGS 8622618, 22 May 1935, familysearch.org; 1940 U.S. Census, Wells, Elko Co., NV, enumeration dist. 4-13, p. 10A.

      27. [27]Leona Peyope, “Washakie Indian News,” Ogden Standard-Examiner, 25 Mar. 1938, A5; Nevada Selective Service System Registration Cards, 1877–97, DGS 4672613, no. 510, 31 Aug. 1878, familysearch.org.

      28. [28]“Indians Come to Chez with Their Troubles,” Salt Lake Telegram, 14 Nov. 1939, 13.

      29. [29]“James M. Pabowena,” 2; Timbimboo, interview, 5 Jan. 2012, p. 13.

      30. [30]Timbimboo, interview, 5 Jan. 2012, p. 13; Grant Morgan Parry, interview by Paula B. Watkins, 18 June 2013, transcript, p. 62, CHL; “Clearfield Navy Supply Depot, 1942,” 50 Stories for 50 Years, Stewart Library Digital Exhibits, Weber State University, exhibits.weber.edu/s/SC50/page/naval_supply.

      31. [31]“Thomas J. Pabawena,” Ogden Standard-Examiner, 22 Apr. 1950, 7, CHL; 1950 U.S. Census, Garland, Box Elder Co., UT, enumeration dist. 2-34, p. 12; “James M. Pabowena,” 2.

      32. [32]“Tribe Members in Brigham Thursday,” Box Elder Journal (Brigham City, UT), 26 May 1950, [1].

      33. [33]“James M. Pabowena,” 2; “Ben Benson Pabawena,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org. Bannock Creek Branch historical reports record James’s death. (Quarterly Historical Report, 31 Aug. 1967, Bannock Creek Branch Manuscript History and Historical Reports, CHL.)

      34. [34]Tremonton and Garland, UT, Obituaries, 1959–2013, DGS 100693078, vol. P, image 1, 27 Aug. 1967, familysearch.org; “James M. Pabowena,” 2.