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    Jim John Neaman Sr. (1901–1967)

    Jim John Neaman Sr. was a Northwestern Shoshone congregational leader and member of the bishopric in the Washakie Ward. He was born in Washakie, Utah, on 14 July 1901 to father Moses Neaman, an Eastern Shoshone, and mother Rebecca Widgagee, who came from a prominent Northwestern Shoshone family.1 Throughout his life, Jim John was known by family and friends as Jim John or Jim.2 Jim’s parents separated when he was about four years old, and he lived with his father, Moses, at Washakie during his childhood and youth. Rebecca also remained in the Washakie community.3 Jim was raised hunting and farming with his father and was an avid baseball player.4

    On 7 August 1909, Jim was baptized and confirmed as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.5 This marked the beginning of his devotion to the church that would define the rest of his life. Both his parents were staunch Latter-day Saints, and Jim’s grandfather Eddie Peah John Widgagee (1855–1906) had been a carpenter during the construction of the Logan Temple.6 Jim’s religious service started at twelve years old when he was ordained a deacon on 19 January 1914. He later received a call as first counselor in the deacons quorum presidency around 1922 and as deacons quorum president in 1924.7

    Jim married Emmeline Pabawena, who came from a Western Shoshone family, in a customary Shoshone ceremony on 30 May 1924.8 They lived with Moses during the first few years of their marriage.9 Together Jim and Emmeline had eight children, six of whom survived to adulthood: Lee Allen (1925–1981), Eleanor Jane (1927–2000), Jim John Jr. (1931–2002), Raymond Orlein (1934–1955), Kenneth Lewis (1937–2008), and Lana Lorene (1940–2016).10 In 1926, less than two years after Jim and Emmeline’s marriage, he was called to teach children in the Washakie Ward Primary, and the following year he was called as second assistant to Sunday School Superintendent Moroni Timbimboo, with responsibilities over adult religious education. He was ordained an elder on 13 March 1927.11 Jim spoke often in Sunday meetings and covered topics like the authority of the priesthood and experiences he had had being healed through the priesthood.12

    A veritable deluge of callings and church responsibilities followed. From 1929 to 1930, Jim was called as a counselor to Nephi Perdash in the Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Association, replaced Moroni Timbimboo as superintendent of the Sunday School, and was ordained as a Seventy, or local missionary.13 A Deseret News reporter took notice of Jim’s Sunday School and wrote, “The efficiency of the school is remarkable. . . . Attendance of workers and members is always high. This school has an excellent reputation for the way it co-operates with the [Malad] stake board.”14

    During his tenure as superintendent of the Sunday School, Jim and Emmeline decided to solemnize their marriage civilly and in the temple. They received their endowments and were sealed in the Logan Temple on 28 January 1932.15 After serving as Sunday School superintendent for nine years, Jim was prepared to take on even more responsibility in the Washakie Ward. He was ordained a high priest and chosen as second counselor in the first all-Native American bishopric in the church’s history.16 Newspapers across Utah reported on the historic event, showing Jim standing proudly alongside Bishop Moroni Timbimboo and fellow counselor Nephi Perdash.17 The bishopric served the community for six years until their release in 1945. Jim was immediately called into the new bishopric headed by Euro-American Glen Morris.18 Just two years later, Morris was released and Newel J. Cutler, who was also Euro-American, replaced him. Cutler retained Jim as a counselor in the bishopric alongside Timbimboo and they served together until 1956, when Jim was finally released from the Washakie Ward bishopric after 17 years.19 Jim finished his long tenure in Washakie Ward leadership callings as ward clerk from 1957 to 1960.20

    In the midst of church responsibilities, Jim supported his family through seasonal agricultural labor like sugar beet thinning and sheep shearing.21 This seasonal circuit often took him to other communities in the Intermountain West, including Bannock Creek, Idaho.22 He likely worked on his father’s farm near Washakie as well. After the onset of the Great Depression, Washakie farm worker wages stagnated, so Jim and his family joined many other Washakie families in working in the wartime industries created by World War II.23 After the war, he and his half-brother Linford remained in the Washakie community and evidently found work as farm laborers in the area, even as others departed for opportunity elsewhere.24

    In 1958, Jim and his daughter Eleanor went to visit his son Lee in Toppenish, Washington.25 While there, Jim suffered a serious heart attack and had to remain in Washington at the behest of his physicians at the local hospital.26 Over the next few years, Jim visited Washakie to see friends and family, but his permanent residence remained in Toppenish.27 His granddaughter Odessa Neaman remembered frequent visits to her grandfather’s house situated down the road from her home. Jim likely attended the local Toppenish “Lamanite” Branch, where Lee served in multiple leadership callings and as branch president, but Jim’s declining health kept him from continuing the kind of responsibility he had at Washakie. On 23 February 1967, Jim passed away in Toppenish.28 The local Yakima Nation to which Lee’s wife, Lucille, belonged honored Jim with a customary burial outfit and dressing ceremony before transporting his body back to his hometown, Washakie.29 Jim was buried at the Washakie cemetery on 28 February 1967.30

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    Jim John Neaman Sr. (1901–1967), Native Saints, accessed May 28, 2026 https://www.churchhistorianspress.org/native-saints/biographies/jim-john-neaman-sr

      Footnotes

      1. [1]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 168, 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); Utah Death Certificates, 1904–51, microfilm 2224906, no. 51-020049, image 295, familysearch.org; Logan Temple Endowments for the Dead, 1884–1970, microfilm 177996, vol. Y, p. 198, FSL; see also “Jim John Neaman Sr.,” “Moses Neaman,” and “Rebecca Widgagee,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      2. [2]News correspondents and census officials occasionally referred to him as James, but Jim John Neaman was his full name for his entire life. Some descendants knew him as Uncle Jim. (“Shoshone Council Asks ‘Lost Lands’ Payment,” Salt Lake Tribune, 12 Jan. 1949, 13; Utah, Church Census Records, 1914–60, DGS 8622610, image 2726, familysearch.org; Elva Roma Neaman Schramm, interview by Paula B. Watkins, 23 Mar. 2015, transcript, pp. 64, 85, CHL.)

      3. [3]See Moses Neaman’s biography for the chronology of his relationships.

      4. [4]Matthew E. Kreitzer, ed., The Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary: Northwestern Shoshone Journalist and Leader, 1906–1929 (Utah State University Press, 2000), 105, 148, 185, 200.

      5. [5]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 194, Record of Members Collection, CHL.

      6. [6]Biography of Moses Neaman; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 155, Record of Members Collection, CHL; 1880 U.S. Census, Plymouth Precinct, Box Elder Co., Utah Territory, enumeration dist. 6, p. 99C, familysearch.org; Washakie Ward Record Book, 1887–1909, image 60, CHL; Marion Everton, “History of Logan Temple Is Retold,” Herald-Journal (Logan, UT), 25 Jan. 1936, 5; see also “Eddie Peah John Widgagee,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org. Eddie Peah John Widgagee was the father of Jim’s mother, Rebecca Widgagee. He was also known as John Nandonai.

      7. [7]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 194, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, 1902–33, 1943–62, vol. 3, 4 May 1924; vol. 6, p. 177, 16 Apr. 1922, CHL.

      8. [8]Washakie Branch, part 2, image 263, Record of Members Collection, CHL; biography of Emmeline Pabawena Neaman. A local Shoshone journalist, Willie Ottogary, recorded that Jim and Emmeline were “married in the Indian old way.” (Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 149.)

      9. [9]Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 157.

      10. [10]“Lee Allen Neaman,” “Eleanor Jane Neaman,” “Howard Neaman Junior,” “Jim John Neaman Jr.,” “Raymond Orlein Neaman,” “Reed Willie Neaman,” “Kenneth Lewis Neaman,” “Lana Lorene Neaman,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      11. [11]Washakie Ward Sunday School Minutes and Records, 1910–26, 1961, vol. 4, 21 Mar. 1926, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 7, p. [52], 13 Feb. 1927, CHL; Malad Idaho Stake Melchizedek Priesthood Minutes and Records, 1872–1973, vol. 19, 13 Mar. 1927, CHL; see also biography of Moroni Timbimboo.

      12. [12]Malad Idaho Stake Melchizedek Priesthood Minutes and Records, vol. 20, 14 July. 1929, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 6, p. 52, 14 Sept. 1919, CHL.

      13. [13]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 4, 22 Jan. 1929, CHL; biography of Nephi Perdash; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, 1847, 1874–1965, image 53, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 194, Record of Members Collection, CHL.

      14. [14]“Handicapped Have Special Sessions of Sunday School,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 18 Nov. 1933, [39].

      15. [15]Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178054, vol. A, p. 657, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings of Living Couples, 1884–1957, microfilm 178139, vol. A, p. 328, FSL.

      16. [16]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 53, 57, 61, 63, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 194, Record of Members Collection, CHL.

      17. [17]“Washakie Ward Elects All Indian Bishopric,” Salt Lake Tribune, 29 Jan. 1939, 10A; “The New All Indian Washakie Ward Bishopric,” Bear River Valley Leader (Tremonton, UT), 9 Feb. 1939, 2; see also biography of Nephi Perdash.

      18. [18]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 67, CHL; see also “Changes in Stake and Ward Officers,” Deseret News, 19 May 1945, [24]; “Glen Morris,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      19. [19]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 67, 81, CHL; “Newel James Cutler,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      20. [20]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 85, 103, CHL.

      21. [21]Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 147; Mrs. Joseph Parry, “Washakie,” Bear River Valley Leader, 14 Apr. 1932, 2.

      22. [22]Margaret Morgan Parry, “Washakie,” Bear River Valley Leader, 25 Aug. 1932, 6.

      23. [23]“The Washakie Ward”; “A Record of the Meeting Held at the Church Office Bldg.,” Salt Lake City, UT, 26 Mar. 1973, The Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation Tribal Library, available at Utah State University Digital History Collections, libraryusu.access.preservica.com (The Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation Tribal Library hereafter cited as NWBSNTL); Moroni Timbimboo and Amy Hootchew Timbimboo, interview by Martin E. Seneca, Jr., 25 July 1967, transcript, pp. 18, 21, 49, Doris Duke Oral History Collection, Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City; Elva Roma Neaman Schramm, interview by Dan Kane, Rios Pacheco, and Karen Duffy, transcript, Sept. 2001, p. 12, NWBSNTL.

      24. [24]Elva Schramm, interview by Odessa Neaman, 9 Jan. 1990, transcript, p. 7, Charles Redd Center for Western Studies Oral History Project, L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT.

      25. [25]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 91, 103, CHL; “Jim John Neaman,” Ogden (UT) Standard-Examiner, 27 Feb. 1967, 2B.

      26. [26]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 103, CHL.

      27. [27]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 109, CHL.

      28. [28]Odessa Neaman, interview by Jessie Embry, 17 July 1990, transcript, pp. 1–3, Charles Redd Center for Western Studies Oral History Project, L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 109, CHL; “Jim John Neaman,” 2B.

      29. [29]Neaman, interview, 17 July 1990, pp. 1–2.

      30. [30]“Jim John Neaman Sr.,” Washakie Cemetery, Washakie, Box Elder Co., UT, Memorial ID 130156221, Find a Grave, accessed 11 Feb. 2026, findagrave.com; “Jim John Neaman,” 2B.