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Native SaintsNative Saints

    The Washakie Ward

    The Washakie Ward was a Northwestern Shoshone congregation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints four miles south of the Utah-Idaho border. Following decades of Euro-American Latter-day Saint expansion into the Northwestern Shoshone debia’, or homeland, in present-day northern Utah and southern Idaho, in the 1870s some Shoshone reported receiving visions that convinced them that joining the church would allow their people to remain in their homeland rather than remove to the Fort Hall Reservation in southeastern Idaho. Under the direction of George Washington Hill and the Northwestern Shoshone Mission, the Shoshone Saints struggled to establish a viable farming community at various locations in northern Utah and southern Idaho before finding a suitable location just south of Portage, Utah Territory, in 1880. They named it Washakie in honor of the great Eastern Shoshone dai’gwahni’, or chief. At Washakie, they worked with Bishop Isaac E. D. Zundel and other Euro-American Latter-day Saint missionaries to achieve economic and religious self-sufficiency within the surrounding settler society. They did not view this process as a rejection of their Shoshone culture, but instead, as resilient Natives had always done, as an opportunity to acquire new tools that would enable them to survive as Shoshone Latter-day Saints in a world markedly altered by Euro-Americans.

    The Washakie community was established during a nationwide movement to assimilate Native peoples into the American mainstream. Since the founding of the United States, politicians and policy makers had assumed that Indigenous cultures were remnants of “savagery” and doomed to extinction given the inexorable advance of “civilization” as represented by the United States. The government and institutions such as churches, they felt, had an obligation to rescue Native peoples from that fate by instructing them in the “arts of civilization,” understood as Euro-American agriculture, private property, English-language education, and Christianity. To achieve these objectives, reformers advocated providing training in farming, breaking up reservations into individual allotments, forcibly sending children to boarding schools, banning traditional religious practices, and encouraging the adoption of Christianity. These efforts further decreased tribal land bases and simultaneously freed up more land for Euro-American settlement.1 While the Euro-American missionaries who aided the Shoshone Saints at Washakie shared many of these assumptions, they also attempted to adapt their program to Shoshone culture.

    On 23 May 1880, Zundel wrote optimistically that the 1,760-acre church farm would be “a place where the Indians will become selfsustaining in time,” both economically and religiously. The Shoshone Latter-day Saints—who numbered approximately two hundred in 1880—were likewise “very well satisfide” with the location, especially in contrast to their previous farms at sites with inadequate water, timber, and other resources.2 The community was led by John Moemberg, also known as Ech-up-wy, who along with dai’gwahni Sagwitch had done more than anyone to set the Northwestern Shoshone on their path toward joining the church and adopting Euro-American methods of agriculture. Another Northwestern Shoshone, Alma Shoshonitz, who spoke some English, was also recognized as a principal leader in Washakie.3 The community’s first task was to complete a canal that diverted fresh water from the nearby Samaria Creek to irrigate their lands.4 They subsequently planted grain and raised sheep, cattle, and horses; they also ran a brick kiln and a sawmill.5 With Zundel and other missionaries paying fees and helping with paperwork, several Shoshone men in the community applied for homesteads in the 1880s.6 Shoshone women learned from Elizabeth Harding Zundel and other Euro-American missionary wives how to sew Euro-American–style clothing and other domestic skills.7

    Young Shoshone also attended a day school in the community’s multipurpose meetinghouse. Like prior Native groups that had embraced Christianity in the midst of upheaval, in part so that they could gain access to Euro-American education, the Shoshone Saints reported as early as 1877 that they were “very anxious for their children to start to school as soon as possible.”8 At this time, federal officials were developing a system of off-reservation boarding schools intent on removing Indigenous children from the perceived “savage” environment of their homes and placing them in settings that would reinforce the superiority of Euro-American “civilization.” In contrast, the Washakie day school taught basic reading, writing, arithmetic, and art within the community. Instruction was in English, but Zundel insisted that “they retain their own tongue.”9 In February 1885, one of the pupils—“Billy”—wrote to George Washington Hill, the missionary who had baptized him: “I am going to school now and you will see that I have learned to write a little. . . . I am thankful to God that I have been baptized and also for the brethren who are teaching us.”10

    Many of the mission’s endeavors in agriculture aligned with the vision of national reformers who wanted Native people to cease hunting, gathering, and other supposed “savage” activities in favor of “civilized” life in an agriculture community. However, at Washakie the Shoshone Saints incorporated these new lifeways while retaining much of their traditional culture. Around seasonal agricultural cycles, they continued to hunt game and gather pine nuts. They also made deerskin gloves, which they sold for additional income.11 And during Washakie’s early years they “all work[ed] in common,” reinvesting their profits from the farm to benefit the whole, which was completely at odds with mainstream white reformers who viewed the cultivation of individualism and private property as the only viable means to eliminate “savage” cultural traits.12

    Following the move to Washakie, the mission gradually assumed characteristics of a ward, or congregation, within the church’s ecclesiastical organization.13 Zundel had been serving as president of the mission since 1877. On 3 September 1880, he was “set apart as Bishop over the Indian Ward,” giving him additional powers and responsibilities.14 Over the next few years, the congregation added a Sunday School, a Mutual Improvement Association for youth, a Primary Association for children, and a Relief Society for women, with Elizabeth Zundel as the first president.15 Shoshone men were ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood and assigned to quorums in the Box Elder Stake. By 1883, Washakie was not only a farm and mission, but also a fully functioning Native Latter-day Saint congregation.16 Although the missionaries kept detailed congregational records during the ward’s earliest years, nearly all were lost to fires in 1887 and in 1891. Stake records, missionary journals and letters, and newspaper accounts help illuminate the community’s late nineteenth-century history.17

    Paternalistic assumptions framed relations between the Euro-American missionaries and the Shoshone Saints in the Washakie Ward. Reflecting a broader practice among whites and Natives, missionaries and church leaders were called “fathers” and Shoshone converts were referred to as “children.”18 At times, Natives turned this language back onto the missionaries, such as when Isaac Zundel preached to the Shoshone “with the pipe in [his] mouth,” which violated the Saints’ health code, the Word of Wisdom. He recounted that “they soon told me I was a pretty father to puff away at a pipe,” a good-natured rebuke that persuaded him to discard the pipe.19 The Book of Mormon also shaped race relations in the ward, with Euro-American church members viewing the Shoshone Saints as Lamanites, and many Shoshone Saints themselves embracing Lamanite identity.20

    White missionaries and their wives initially filled most positions in the bishopric, Relief Society, Sunday School, and youth organizations. However, with the noteworthy exceptions of bishop and Relief Society president, which were filled by Euro-American missionary couples from the 1880s through 1939,21 from the beginning there was a concerted effort to call Shoshone Saints to other leadership positions. In 1883, Elizabeth Zundel, the first Relief Society president, selected Cohn Shoshonitch Zundel, daughter of community leader Alma Shoshonitch, as a counselor.22 Cohn’s husband, Moroni Zundel—a Shoshone who adopted the Zundel surname—became the first Native superintendent of the Sunday School in 1890, while Yeager Timbimboo, son of the dai’gwahni’ Sagwitch, became the first Shoshone president of the Washakie Ward Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Association in 1891.23 In April 1908, Yeager Timbimboo and James Joshua were sustained as Bishop George M. Ward’s counselors—the first Native high priests in the ward’s history—with Malad Stake President Milton H. Welling explaining that they were called “to perfect the organization of the Bishopric of the ward.” Ammon Pubigee, who was educated at the Washakie day school, was sustained as the first Shoshone ward clerk.24 Ammon was one of several literate Shoshone clerks who carefully created and preserved congregational records during the early decades of the twentieth century.25

    The Shoshone Saints worked to understand and practice their new faith in their church meetings, which were largely conducted in their own language. Visitors who attended these meetings described hearing prayers, songs, and sermons in Shoshone. Eliza R. Snow, the church’s general Relief Society president, was impressed by the ward choir, comprising six men and six women, who performed songs “with many variations in their tunes.” Although Snow considered the songs “very peculiar,” she nevertheless found “the perfection of their time [to be] truly astonishing.” The sacrament was administered by Shoshone Elders, presumably in English, and the congregation sang from the English hymnal.26 Even those who could not read English found value in holding the hymnal and participating in the song. Mae Timbimboo Parry recalled that her “Grandmother Yampatch [Wongan Timbimboo] could not read or write. She never attended school. When she went to church she hummed the tunes. Also when it came time to sing from a hymn book she held up an open book just for looks.”27 Given that older community members lacked opportunity to attend school, church services at Washakie remained predominantly in Shoshone well into the twentieth century.28

    In addition to Sunday worship, residents of Washakie had a special relationship with the Logan Temple, having contributed their labor to its construction.29 Following the building’s dedication in 1884, Zundel recommended several Shoshone couples to receive their “endowments and other blessings” in the sacred edifice. More would follow in subsequent years.30 Moses Neaman, an Eastern Shoshone, reportedly had a vision prior to his baptism that “told him that someday there will be a big building [in Logan] for the Lord,” which his descendants concluded must have referred to the temple.31 Many Washakie Shoshone also found great meaning in performing proxy temple ordinances for their deceased relatives. For example, in March 1885 Sagwitch performed proxy work in the Logan Temple for his father, Pin-in-nets-e, and Saw-hout-chew, his brother.32

    Despite the general emphasis among Euro-American Latter-day Saints on assimilation, there was remarkable tolerance of traditional Shoshone practices during the early twentieth century. For example, the church officially recognized Native customary marriages into the 1930s.33 There was also little if any discouragement offered to practitioners of traditional Shoshone medicine and practices associated with bo’ha, or spiritual power. For example, ordained Elder Seth Eagle Pubigee, who was endowed and sealed in the temple in 1933, was subsequently interviewed by anthropologist Julian Steward about Shoshone bo’ha. Pubigee recounted how his father, Ammon—Washakie ward clerk and Sunday School superintendent—had been a powerful user of bo’ha, or bo’hagunt, as were other relatives on both sides of his family. Seth described his own experiences with spirit guides who taught him traditional medicinal practices, songs, and dances, all considered purveyors of bo’ha.34 Grouse Creek Jack, also known as Pugah Junip Jack, was also an ordained elder who attended the Washakie Ward in the early twentieth century and was later known as both a devout Latter-day Saint and a Sun Dancer.35

    The Shoshone Saints also utilized the literacy they learned at the Washakie day school to advocate for their rights under the 1863 Treaty of Box Elder.36 Willie Ottogary—an ordained Seventy, Sunday School superintendent, missionary, and a widely published journalist in northern Utah newspapers—became a treaty-rights activist who traveled to Washington, DC, to lobby for his people. He argued that the Box Elder treaty recognized Shoshone territory in Utah, Idaho, and Nevada, and that the federal government had failed to compensate the Shoshone for taking, dividing, and selling their land. Ottogary further contended that the government had an obligation to establish a Northwestern Shoshone reservation in the Bear River Valley. Although Ottogary’s treaty-rights activism did not bear fruit prior to his untimely death in 1929, his efforts laid a foundation for the tribe’s subsequent litigation and political organization.37

    Literacy acquired at the Washakie day school also aided the Northwestern Shoshone to preserve their culture and history. Mae Timbimboo Parry, a great-granddaughter of Sagwitch, later recalled how when she “was about 12 years old,” she “started to write” the stories she heard Yeager Timbimboo, her grandfather, share. She and other Washakie girls subsequently attended the Sherman Institute in Riverside, California, over the objections of Bishop George M. Ward, who distrusted the government school. Parry did not stop writing, but recorded her people’s history for the remainder of her life.38

    The Washakie Ward was something of an anomaly in the church’s organization. Beginning with Zundel, the bishops had been tasked with not only serving the needs of the Shoshone ward members but also overseeing the large church farm. Citing the dual qualifications deemed necessary, paternalistic missionaries and other Euro-American church leaders waited decades before calling a Native bishop.39 In 1939, church leaders separated the position of bishop from that of farm administrator and called as the ward’s first Shoshone bishop Moroni Timbimboo, who attended the Washakie day school as a youth and who had previously served as ward clerk, Sunday School superintendent, missionary, and counselor in the bishopric.40 When he was a child, Moroni contracted smallpox, a deadly infectious disease. He recalled having a dream that convinced him that his life would be spared because he had a “special mission” to fulfill, which he later interpreted to mean his service as bishop of the Washakie Ward. Moroni—a grandson of Sagwitch and son of Yeager Timbimboo, who served as a counselor in the Washakie Ward bishopric for over two decades—“didn’t claim to be a chief on account that we believe in Mormonism and I believe it is more than a chief to believe in Mormonism,” providing some insight into how Moroni and possibly others viewed the relationship between the Latter-day Saint office of bishop and Shoshone dai’gwahni’.41 On 22 January 1939—the day that a new brick ward meetinghouse was dedicated—Moroni Timbimboo was sustained as the first Shoshone bishop of the Washakie Ward.42 Subsequently, Rhoda Moemberg Woonsook—great-granddaughter of community founder John Moemberg—was ordained as the ward’s first Shoshone Relief Society president three weeks later on 17 February 1939.43

    In many ways, the appointment of a Native bishop and Relief Society president marked the zenith of the Washakie Ward’s history. From a high of around two hundred ward members during the community’s early years, the population of the ward slowly declined in subsequent decades due to infectious diseases, infant mortality, and out-migration to Fort Hall. The Great Depression marked a turning point in the community’s history, as the church farm was unable to provide adequate employment for the Shoshone Saints, many of whom had either voluntarily sold their individual homesteads or lost them after missing tax payments, leaving them with no independent means of support. Some Shoshone began leaving Washakie in search of employment elsewhere.44 In 1939, ward membership dipped to 100.45

    Convinced that the Washakie farm needed to be modernized if it was going to survive, Euro-American church leaders initiated an ambitious revitalization program known as the Washakie Project in 1939. Fullmer Allred, who had training from Utah State University in agricultural science, was hired as farm manager. Allred, working with a committee, purchased substantial additional acreage for cultivation. They also acquired cattle, chickens, and pigs. They installed a water system for the town and made plans to replace log homes with cinder block houses, two of which were completed. As part of the plan, Allred determined that the Shoshone should be paid wages for their work, half in scrip redeemable at the bishops’ storehouse and half in cash. Although Allred claimed that his workers were paid average farm wages for the era, many Shoshone Saints found the wages insufficient to support their families. They soon learned that employment opportunities in the defense industry would pay substantially more. Mirroring wider trends of Natives seeking employment in cities, the out-migration from Washakie accelerated during the 1940s.46

    Following Moroni Timbimboo’s release as bishop in 1945, he was replaced by non-Native Glen Morris. However, Shoshone men continued to be called as bishopric counselors, and Shoshone women, most notably Moroni’s wife, Amy Hootchew Timbimboo, continued to serve as Relief Society president. In total, she served more than four decades in the Washakie Ward Relief Society presidency.47 In 1960 the ward, with only thirty-seven members, was reclassified as a branch, which in turn was dissolved in 1966.48 Leaving Washakie did not, however, mean leaving the church, as many continued as active church members.49

    Although in diaspora, the Washakie Shoshone persisted as a people. Willie Ottogary had first articulated the argument that the federal government had failed to compensate the Shoshone for their lands under the 1863 Treaty of Box Elder. In the 1930s, the Northwestern Shoshone at Washakie had voted to accept the Indian Reorganization Act, which authorized them to form a tribal government and receive federal benefits. Northwestern Shoshone leaders took no immediate action to organize under the IRA—evidently because they feared that formal organization would hurt their efforts to test Ottogary’s argument in the courts. They did, however, have a chairperson and maintain an informal tribal council to manage their legal endeavors. Their suit reached the United States Supreme Court, with the court ruling against the tribe in 1945 based on the ambiguous terms of the Box Elder Treaty.50 However, in 1968 the Indian Claims Commission reached a settlement with the Northwestern and other Shoshone bands that provided $15.7 million in compensation for the loss of their land.51

    By the late 1960s, nearly all of the Shoshone Saints had moved away from Washakie for work. Yet many maintained homes in the community, believing that the church had given them Washakie to use in perpetuity.52 Euro-American church leaders, however, saw the out-migration as evidence that the Washakie farm had succeeded inasmuch as it had given the Shoshone Saints skills and tools to assimilate into the broader society.53 Believing incorrectly that the Shoshone’s dispersal meant they had permanently abandoned Washakie, church leaders decided to sell the farm, which included the townsite. Operating under the direction of local church leaders, in 1969 farm manager Lamar Cutler burned homes believed to have been abandoned. When Washakie resident Geneva Alex Pacheco informed Cutler that she was still living in her home, he had a church attorney send her an eviction notice. Evidently not all residents had vacated the premises when the sale occurred in 1972, as the Malad Stake history noted in September 1973 that “efforts [were] to be made to remove the remaining Indians from Washakie to help new owner of project.” The sale of the land and the accompanying removal of the remaining residents proved to be a traumatic event. While many former Washakie Shoshone, including Moroni and Amy Timbimboo and Leona Peyope Hasuse, remained committed to the church, for others the burnings caused a rupture that continues to reverberate among Northwestern Shoshone descendants.54

    In March 1973, tribal chairman Frank Timbimboo, son of Moroni and Amy Hootchew Timbimboo, brought the tribe’s grievances before church authorities. In response, the church provided some compensation to individual Washakie residents who had lost property when their homes were burned. And at the behest of leaders including President Spencer W. Kimball, a long-standing advocate for Native peoples, the church also donated 184 acres of land around Portage, Utah, to the Northwestern Shoshone. According to Mae Timbimboo Parry, the land was converted to “trust lands to fulfill the federal requirement enabling residents to receive government aid.”55

    A century after Sagwitch’s death in 1887, community members adopted a constitution and formally reorganized under the IRA as the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation.56 In 2018, the tribe exercised its sovereignty by purchasing the site of the Bear River Massacre, where hundreds of their ancestors were slain by the U.S. Army in 1863, and have since embarked on a multi-year reclamation endeavor to restore and heal the land and river.57

    Washakie today is a ghost town, with only the brick chapel built by the Shoshone Saints in 1939, a schoolhouse, and two abandoned houses left as a testament of the once-vibrant community. Nevertheless, the memory of Washakie persists. Down the road is the Washakie cemetery (now owned by the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation), where generations of faithful Shoshone Latter-day Saints, starting with Sagwitch in 1887, were buried.58 Members of the Northwestern Band remain confident that the day will come when they will possess the town that for so long their ancestors called home. Even though some Northwestern Shoshone no longer affiliate with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, citizens of the nation today recognize the dedication of their forebears in laying a foundation for their people and future.

    Cite this page

    The Washakie Ward, Native Saints, accessed May 28, 2026 https://www.churchhistorianspress.org/native-saints/essays/the-washakie-ward

      Footnotes

      1. [1]See Frederick E. Hoxie, A Final Promise: The Campaign to Assimilate the Indians, 1880–1920, 2nd ed. (University of Nebraska Press, 2001); Henrietta Mann, Cheyenne-Arapaho Education, 1871–1982 (University Press of Colorado, 1997); David Wallace Adams, Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875–1928, 2nd ed.; rev. ed. (University Press of Kansas, 2020); Tom Holm, The Great Confusion in Indian Affairs: Native Americans & Whites in the Progressive Era (University of Texas Press, 2005); and Brenda J. Child, Boarding School Seasons: American Indian Families, 1900–1940, 2nd ed. (University of Nebraska Press, 2012); “George Washington Hill” and “Isaac Eberhard David Zundel,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      2. [2]Isaac E. D. Zundel, Alexander Hunsaker, and Moroni Ward to John Taylor, 23 May 1880, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, 1877–87, Church History Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City (Church History Library hereafter cited as CHL); Lorenzo Snow, E. F. Sheets, and Henry Tingey to John Taylor and Council, 1 Apr. 1880, Brigham City Mercantile and Manufacturing Association Records, 1865–95, CHL; see also “The Northwestern Shoshone Mission.”

      3. [3]Seymour B. Young to Lorenzo Snow and the Council of the Twelve Apostles, ca. July 1889, Wilford Woodruff Stake Correspondence Files, 1887–98, CHL; George Q. Cannon, Journal, 17 Oct. 1881, Journal of George Q. Cannon, Church Historian’s Press, churchhistorianspress.org/george-q-cannon; “Bishop Zundell’s Wards,” Deseret Evening News (Salt Lake City), 9 Sept. 1884, [3]. See biographies of John Moemberg and Alma Shoshonitz. Following the Corinne Scare of 1875, Sagwitch had gone for a time to the Fort Hall Reservation. By the early 1880s, Sagwitch was living in Washakie. (See biography of Sagwitch Timbimboo.)

      4. [4]Zundel, Hunsaker, and Ward to Taylor, 23 May 1880; “Indian Farm,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 29 Apr. 1885, 225; see also “The Northwestern Shoshone Mission.”

      5. [5]Isaac E. D. Zundel to John Taylor, 1 Nov. 1880, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; “Bishop Zundell’s Wards,” [3]; Seymour B. Young to Wilford Woodruff and “Counselors,” 1 Jan. 1893, Wilford Woodruff Stake Correspondence Files, CHL; “Indian Farm,” 225; Isaac E. D. Zundel and Moroni Ward to John Taylor, 12 June 1885, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL.

      6. [6]Isaac E. D. Zundel, Journal, 11 Aug. 1883, Isaac E. and Elizabeth J. Zundel Journals, 1882–1922, CHL; “Bishop Zundell’s Wards,” 3; George Washington Hill to John Taylor, 21 Sept. 1886, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; Martha C. Knack, “Utah Indians and the Homestead Laws,” in State and Reservation: New Perspectives on Federal Indian Policy, ed. George Pierre Castile and Robert L. Bee (University of Arizona Press, 1992), 66–73.

      7. [7]Elizabeth Harding Zundel, Journal, 24 June and 7 July 1883, Isaac E. and Elizabeth J. Zundel Journals, CHL; Eliza R. Snow, “An Interesting Trip: The Lamanites Improving, Relief Society News—Silk Industry,” Woman’s Exponent (Salt Lake City), 1 July 1883, 16–17; see also Indianola Ward Relief Society, Minutes, 16 Sept. 1880, in The First Fifty Years of Relief Society: Key Documents in Latter-day Saint Women’s History, ed. Jill Mulvay Derr, Carol Cornwall Madsen, Kate Holbrook, and Matthew J. Grow (Church Historian’s Press, 2016), 483–86; “Elizabeth Jane Harding,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      8. [8]George Washington Hill to the First Presidency, 1 Apr. 1877, Brigham Young Office Files, 1832–78, CHL; Isaac E. D. Zundel to John Taylor, 20 Aug. 1878, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; “Bishop Zundell’s Wards,” [3]; Linford D. Fisher, The Indian Great Awakening: Religion and the Shaping of Native Cultures in Early America (Oxford University Press, 2012), chap. 6.

      9. [9]“Bishop Zundell’s Wards,” [3]; see also Mae Timbimboo Parry, “The Northwestern Shoshone,” in A History of Utah’s American Indians, ed. Forrest S. Cuch (Utah State Division of Indian Affairs; Utah State Division of History, 2003), 55–57; and Adams, Education for Extinction.

      10. [10]“Educating the Indians,” Deseret News, 18 Feb. 1885, 67.

      11. [11]Cannon, Journal, 17 Oct. 1881; Isaac E. D. Zundel to John W. Hess, 21 Sept. 1882, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; Seymour B. Young to Wilford Woodruff and “Counselors,” 18 Feb. 1895, Wilford Woodruff Stake Correspondence Files, CHL; Matthew E. Kreitzer, The Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary: Northwestern Shoshone Journalist and Leader, 1906–1929 (Utah State University Press, 2000), 24, 55, 80.

      12. [12]Hoxie, Final Promise, chap. 5; Adams, Education for Extinction, 20–21; “Bishop Zundell’s Wards,” [3]; Isaac E. D. Zundel to John Taylor, 10 Jan. 1887, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; John W. Hess and Isaac E. D. Zundel to John Taylor, 4 Feb. 1887, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; “Washakie: An Indian Colony Second to None in the United States,” Box Elder News (Brigham City, UT), 15 Sept. 1909, 27; Robert F. Murphy and Yolanda Murphy, “Northern Shoshone and Bannock,” in Handbook of American Indians, ed. William C. Sturtevant, vol. 11, Great Basin, ed. Warren L. d’Azevedo (Smithsonian Institution, 1986), 293; “United Orders,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics.

      13. [13]See “Wards and Stakes,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics.

      14. [14]Isaac E. D. Zundel to Orson Pratt, 9 Apr. 1881, Historian’s Office Correspondence Files, 1856–1926, CHL; Zundel-Ward Family Record, ca. 1880–1910, p. 9, 3 Sept. 1880, CHL; “Bishop,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics; William G. Hartley, My Fellow Servants: Essays on the History of the Priesthood (BYU Studies, 2010), 234, 257–58.

      15. [15]Washakie Ward Minutes, 1883–1910, p. 16, 20 May 1883, CHL; Box Elder Stake Young Women’s Mutual Improvement Association Minutes, 1875–1944, 1875–91, pp. 210, 218, 13 Nov. 1882 and 12 Sept. 1883, CHL; Isaac E. D. Zundel, Journal, 20 May 1883, Isaac E. and Elizabeth J. Zundel Journals, CHL; Elizabeth Harding Zundel, Journal, 3 June 1883, Isaac E. and Elizabeth J. Zundel Journals, CHL; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, 1847, 1874–1965, images 11, 13, CHL.

      16. [16]Box Elder Stake General Minutes, 1877–1906, 1919–27, Priesthood Meeting Minutes, vol. 1, p. 133, CHL; Seventies Quorum Records, 1844–1975, Quorum 52, 1883–1945, A, vol. 1, 10 Feb. 1884, CHL; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 11, CHL; see also Malad Idaho Stake Melchizedek Priesthood Minutes and Records, 1872–1973, First Quorum of Elders Minute Book, vol. 16, CHL; and “Wards and Stakes,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics.

      17. [17]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 43, CHL; To the Latter Day Saints of the Seventh Ward, [ca. Nov. 1887], Washakie Indian Fund, 1887–88, CHL; Young to Snow and the Council of the Twelve Apostles, ca. July 1889; see also Guide to Church History Library Collections.

      18. [18]George Washington Hill to Brigham Young, 6 May 1873, Brigham Young Office Files, CHL; George Washington Hill to Brigham Young, 15 Aug. 1877, Brigham Young Office Files, CHL; “Educating the Indians,” 67; George Washington Hill to Brigham Young, 15 Aug. 1876, Brigham Young Office Files, CHL; see also Francis Paul Prucha, The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians (University of Nebraska Press, 1984), xxviii.

      19. [19]Box Elder Stake General Minutes, Priesthood Meeting Minutes, vol. 1, p. 19, 1 Dec. 1877, CHL; “Word of Wisdom,” Revelations in Context, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/revelations-in-context.

      20. [20]See, for examples, Charley Perdash, in Washakie Ward General Minutes, 1902–33, 1943–62, vol. 5, p. 95, 11 Sept. 1910, CHL; Dick Arritch, in Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, p. 72, 23 Jan. 1910, CHL; biography of James Joshua; see also “Lamanite Identity,” Church History Topics, churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics.

      21. [21]Euro-American Washakie Ward bishops included Isaac E. D. Zundel (1880–1890), Moroni Ward (1890–1902), George M. Ward (1902–1929), and Joseph Parry (1929–1939). Their wives—Elizabeth Harding Zundel (1883–1891), Eliza Voss Ward (1891–1904), Mary Ann Morris Ward (1904–1929), and Margaret Morgan Parry (1929–1939)—served as ward Relief Society presidents. (See “Diagram of the Bishopric of the Washakie Ward,” Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 17, 51–52, CHL; Elizabeth Harding Zundel, Journal, 3 June 1883, Isaac E. and Elizabeth J. Zundel Journals, CHL; “Brief History for the Year 1934,” in Washakie Ward Relief Society Minutes and Records, 1926–37, 1959–61, vol. 3, p. 2, CHL; and Malad Idaho Stake Relief Society Minutes and Records, 1888–1973, vol. 1, p. 38, 11 July 1891; vol. 7, p. 2, 17 Feb. 1939, CHL.)

      22. [22]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 11, 13, CHL; “Brief History for the Year 1934,” in Washakie Ward Relief Society Minutes and Records, vol. 3, p. 2, CHL; biography of Cohn Shoshonitz Zundel.

      23. [23]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 11, 13, CHL. See biographies of Moroni Zundel and Yeager Timbimboo.

      24. [24]Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, p. 25, 12 Apr. 1908, CHL; Mae Timbimboo Parry, interview by Paul Davis, 13 Apr. 1999, transcript, pp. [2–3], copy in possession of David W. Grua; biographies of James Joshua and Ammon Pubigee; “George Moroni Ward” and “Milton Holmes Welling,” Church History Biographical Database.

      25. [25]More than twenty ledger books containing minutes of Washakie Ward sacrament, priesthood quorum, Relief Society, Sunday School, and youth organizations are housed at the Church History Library. (See Guide to Church History Library Collections.) For examples of other Washakie Ward clerks, see biographies of Willie Ottogary, Moroni Timbimboo, and Lucy Zundel Alex.

      26. [26]Snow, “An Interesting Trip,” 17; William Lee, Journal, pp. 4–5, CHL; “Washakie: Description of the Lamanitish City in Malad Valley,” Utah Journal (Logan), 1 Dec. 1883, [3]; Cannon, Journal, 25 Aug. 1884; A[ndrew] K[imball], “Washakie,” Deseret Weekly (Salt Lake City), 18 Feb. 1893, 277; see also Papago Ward General Minutes, 1891–1976, vol. 4, p. 7, 8 Nov. 1891, CHL; “Eliza R. Snow,” Church History Biographical Database.

      27. [27]“Yampatch Wongan Timbimboo,” Life Sketches, ca. 1990–95, image 103, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, ca. 1880–1990, CHL; see also “Nephi Zundel and Minnie Zundel,” Life Sketches, image 59, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, CHL; “Mae Olive Timbimboo” and “Yampitch Wongan,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      28. [28]Joshua T. Evans, “The Northwestern Shoshone Indians, (a) Under Tribal Organization and Government, (b) Under the Ecclesiastical Administration of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as Exemplified at the Washakie Colony, Utah” (master’s thesis, Utah State University, 1938), 90, https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/7192; Charles E. Dibble, “The Mormon Mission to the Shoshoni Indians,” Part III, Utah Humanities Review 1, no. 3 (1947): 293; Newel J. Cutler, interview by Martin E. Seneca, 11 Aug. 1967, transcript, pp. 13–14, CHL; Grant Morgan Parry, interview by Paula B. Watkins, 29 May 2013, pp. 4–5, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 9, pp. 284–85, 292, 294, 30 May 1954, 15 Aug. 1954, 5 Sept. 1954, CHL.

      29. [29]Box Elder Stake General Minutes, Priesthood Meeting Minutes, vol. 1, pp. 59, 80, CHL; “Washakie: Description of the Lamanitish City,” [3]; Marion Everton, “History of Logan Temple Is Retold,” Herald-Journal (Logan, UT), 21 Dec. 1935, 4; Marion Everton, “History of Logan Temple Is Retold,” Herald-Journal, 4 Jan. 1936, 7; Marion Everton, “History of Logan Temple Is Retold,” Herald-Journal, 11 Jan. 1936, 7; Marion Everton, “History of Logan Temple Is Retold,” Herald-Journal, 18 July 1936, 5.

      30. [30]Isaac E. D. Zundel to John Taylor, 9 Feb. 1885, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178052, vol. A, p. 41, FamilySearch Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City (FamilySearch Library hereafter cited as FSL); Logan Temple Sealings of Living Couples, 1884–1957, microfilm 178135, vol. A, pp. 35–36, FSL; Logan Temple Endowments of the Living, 1884–1957, microfilm 178053, vol. B, pp. 220–21, FSL; Logan Temple Sealings of Living Couples, 1884–1957, microfilm 178138, vol. A, p. 53 FSL.

      31. [31]Jim John Neaman Jr., interview by Rios Pacheco, Sept. 2001, transcript, p. [2], 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 hereafter cited as NWBSNTL); biography of Moses Neaman.

      32. [32]Washakie Ward Record of Members, 1885–86; 1938, Record Book, pp. 36–37, CHL; see also Amanda Hendrix-Komoto, Imperial Zions: Religion, Race, and Family in the American West and the Pacific (University of Nebraska Press, 2022), 11–12.

      33. [33]Abraham H. Cannon, Journal, 24 Jan. 1892, typescript, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 2, image 130, Record of Members Collection, 1836–1970, CHL; F. A. Gross to Mary Pearse Owen, 7 Jan. 1936, Legal Department Subject Files, 1912–51, CHL; Glossary: “Shoshone Customary Marriages.”

      34. [34]Salt Lake Temple Endowments of the Living, 1893–1956, microfilm 184074, vol. H, p. 182, 5 Apr. 1933, FSL; Salt Lake Temple Sealings of Living Couples, 1893–1956, microfilm 1239566, vol. D, p. 682, 5 Apr. 1933, FSL; Julian H. Steward, Cultural Element Distributions: XXIII, Northern and Gosiute Shoshoni, Anthropological Records, vol. 8, no. 3 (University of California Press, 1943), 281–83; “Seth Pubigee,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org. Later in the twentieth century, however, attitudes toward Indigenous medicinal practices had shifted and at least one bo’hagunt concluded that her practice of Shoshone remedies was incompatible with the temple. (See Helen Pubigee Timbimboo, interview by Alicia Martinez and Rios Pacheco, 5 Jan. 2012, transcript, p. 6, CHL.)

      35. [35]Washakie Branch, part 1, image 164, Record of Members Collection, CHL; “Throbbing Tomtoms Stilled as Indians End Sun Dance,” Salt Lake Tribune, 24 July 1939, 8; “Indian, 112, Dies at Gem Reservation,” Ogden (UT) Standard-Examiner, 25 Feb. 1942, 3; “Pugah Junip Jack,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      36. [36]Ottogary’s advocacy presumably would have included the 1863 Treaty of Fort Bridger, which was signed by Washakie, who was seen as the paramount dai’gwahni’ of all the Shoshone bands. The Treaty of Box Elder adopted the Fort Bridger treaty’s provisions as binding on the Northwestern Shoshone. (Ratified Indian Treaty 324, Fort Bridger, Utah Territory, 2 July 1863, NAID 178907394, General Records of the United States Government, RG 11, National Archives, Washington, DC; Ratified Indian Treaty 325, Box Elder Co., Utah Territory, 30 July 1863, NAID 74859412, General Records of the United States Government, RG 11, National Archives, Washington, DC.)

      37. [37]Kreitzer, Washakie Letters of Willie Ottogary, 1–18; see also biographies of Willie Ottogary, George Parago Sam, Thomas Pabawena Jr., and James Martin Pabawena.

      38. [38]Mae Timbimboo Parry, interview by Kathy Bradford, 5 Dec. 1985, transcript, pp. 5–7, copy in possession of David W. Grua.

      39. [39]Thomas H. Richards, Daniel P. Woodland, and E. N. Crowther to Heber J. Grant and Counselors, 30 Jan. 1929, First Presidency Stake Files, 1915–49, CHL; Thomas H. Richards, Daniel P. Woodland, and E. N. Crowther to Heber J. Grant and Counselors, 7 Mar. 1929, First Presidency Stake Files, CHL; Thomas H. Richards to the First Presidency, 21 Nov. 1938, First Presidency Stake Files, CHL.

      40. [40]Malad Idaho Stake Confidential Minutes, 1892–1977, 21 Jan. 1939, CHL; Washakie Branch, part 1, image 157, Record of Members Collection, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, p. 157, 9 Mar. 1913, CHL; Washakie Ward Sunday School Minutes and Records, 1910–26, 1961, vol. 1, 22 June 1913, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 7, 6 Mar. 1927, CHL; Missionary Department Missionary Registers, 1860–1959, bk. F, p. 98, CHL; Moroni Timbimboo to “Friend Morris,” ca. Jan. 1903, in Juvenile Instructor (Salt Lake City), 15 Mar. 1903, 191; Mae Timbimboo Parry, interview by Michele Welch, 2 May 2006, transcript, pp. 10–11, Utah Women’s Walk Oral History Project, Utah Valley University Library, Orem, UT.

      41. [41]Moroni Timbimboo, interview by Colen Sweeten, 9 Dec. 1970, transcript, pp. 1–2, 13–17, CHL; Washakie Ward General Minutes, vol. 5, p. 25, 12 Apr. 1908, CHL; Malad Idaho Stake Confidential Minutes, 4 Apr. 1929, CHL; biography of Moroni Timbimboo.

      42. [42]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 63, CHL; “Washakie Ward Has All Indian Bishopric,” Bear River Valley Leader (Tremonton, UT), 2 Feb. 1939, 1; Moroni Timbimboo, interview, 9 Dec. 1970, pp. 16–17.

      43. [43]Malad Idaho Stake Relief Society Minutes and Records, vol. 7, p. 2, 17 Feb. 1939, CHL; biography of Rhoda Elnora Moemberg Woonsook.

      44. [44]Knack, “Utah Indians and the Homestead Laws,” 66–73; F. A. Gross to Mary Pearse Owen, 30 Jan. 1935, transcript, p. 271, Legal Department Subject Files, 1912–51, CHL; Box Elder Stake Priesthood Meeting Minutes, vol. 1, 1877–1902, p. 133, Box Elder Stake General Minutes, 1877–1906, 1919–27, CHL; Malad Stake General Minutes, 1888–1928, 1960–77, vol. 1, p. 15, CHL; Scott R. Christensen, Sagwitch: Shoshone Chieftain, Mormon Elder, 1822–1887 (Utah State University Press, 1999), 201, 204.

      45. [45]Washakie Branch, part 2, Record of Members Collection, 1836–1970, CHL; Christensen, Sagwitch, 204.

      46. [46]Fullmer Allred, interview by Martin E. Seneca, 4 Aug. 1967, Doris Duke Oral History Collection, Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City; Frank Timbimboo, interview by Martin E. Seneca, 25 July 1967, transcript, pp. 5–6, Doris Duke American Indian Oral History Project, Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City; Stephen L. Smith, interview by Rhett S. James, 16 Dec. 1969, transcript, Rhett S. James Collection, 1965–89, 2003, CHL; “A Record of the Meeting Held at the Church Office Bldg.,” Salt Lake City, UT, 26 Mar. 1973, transcript, pp. 11–12, NWBSNTL; Samuel A. Hendricks, interview by Mark Grover, 9 Feb. 1974, transcript, pp. 5–8, Charles Redd Center for Western Studies Oral History Project, L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT; “Aaron Fullmer Allred,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org; see also Douglas K. Miller, Indians on the Move: Native American Mobility and Urbanization in the Twentieth Century (University of North Carolina Press, 2019).

      47. [47]“Amy Hootchew Timbimboo,” Life Sketches, image 77, Mae Timbimboo Parry Collection, CHL.

      48. [48]Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 67, 104, CHL; biography of Amy Hootchew Timbimboo; “Glen Morris,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      49. [49]The Bannock Creek branch on the Fort Hall Reservation was composed largely of relocated Washakie Ward members. Some Washakie transplants transferred their membership to the church’s Indian Branch in Brigham City as well as predominantly white wards in northern Utah and southern Idaho. (See Bannock Creek Branch General Minutes, 1953–73, vol. 1, 4 Jan. 1953, CHL; Washakie Ward Manuscript History and Historical Reports, images 83, 97, 113, 125, CHL.)

      50. [50]An Act to Conserve and Develop Indian Lands and Resources [. . .] [18 June 1934], The Statutes at Large of the United States of America, from March 1933 to June 1934, Concurrent Resolutions, Recent Treaties and Conventions, Executive Proclamations and Agreements, Twenty-First Amendment to the Constitution (1934), 73rd Cong., 2nd Sess., chap. 576, p. 984; Moroni Timbimboo and Amy Timbimboo, interview by Martin E. Seneca, 25 July 1967, transcript, pp. 23–24, Doris Duke Oral History Collection, Special Collections, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City; Parry, “Northwestern Shoshone,” 68–72; “A Historical Record of the Northwestern Band of Shoshone Indians,” 10 July 1937, NWBSNTL; Frank Timbimboo, interview, pp. 11–12, 21–22; Thomas J. Pabawena and George Parago Sam to Arthur V. Watkins, 10 Dec. 1949, Arthur V. Watkins Papers, L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT; “A Record of the Meeting Held at the Church Office Bldg.”.

      51. [51]The ICC held in 1962 that the Northwestern Shoshone fell under the 1868 Treaty of Fort Bridger, as they were represented by the dai’gwahni’ Washakie. It also ruled that the Northwestern Shoshone held aboriginal title to their traditional homelands. This ruling served as the basis for the settlement with the ICC in 1968. (Ratified Indian Treaty 373, Fort Bridger, Utah Territory, 3 July 1868, NAID 179036097, General Records of the United States Government, RG 11, National Archives, Washington, DC; Shoshone Tribe of Indians of the Wind River Reservation, Wyoming, et al. v. United States Government, 11 Ind. Cl. Comm. 387 [1962]; Northwestern Bands of Shoshone Indians v. United States, 324 U.S. 335 [1945]; Shoshone-Bannock Tribes et al. v. United States, 19 Ind. Cl. Comm. 3 [1968].)

      52. [52]Testimony of Indians Related to the Burning of Houses at Washakie, Utah, June 1974, transcript, NWBSNTL.

      53. [53]Colen Sweeten Jr., “Project of the LDS Church,” in Malad Idaho Stake Centennial History Book, 1888–1988, 154; Rex Waldron, interview by Paula B. Watkins, 1 May 2013, transcript, p. 20, CHL.

      54. [54]“A Record of the Meeting Held at the Church Office Bldg.,” p. 5; Malad Idaho Stake Manuscript History and Historical Reports, 1888–1977, 1958–77, image 259, CHL; Smith, interview, 16 Dec. 1969; “Roy Brothers Purchase Farm,” Sun Chronicle (Roy, UT), 20 Apr. 1972, [12]; Parry, “Northwestern Shoshone,” 58–72; biography of Leona Peyope Hasuse; “Geneva Alex,” Church History Biographical Database, history.churchofjesuschrist.org.

      55. [55]“Church Sells Washakie Farm,” Deseret News, 3 Apr. 1972, 8C; “A Record of the Meeting Held at the Church Office Bldg.”; Parry, “Northwestern Shoshone,” 64, 67; Bruce G. Parry and Darlene Parry, interview by Scott R. Christensen and Paula B. Watkins, 29 Aug. 2013, transcript, p. 47, CHL; Malad Idaho Stake Manuscript History and Historical Reports, image 267, CHL; “Frank Leonard Timbimboo,” Church History Biographical Database, churchofjesuschrist.org.

      56. [56]Parry, “Northwestern Shoshone,” 72; Sandra Pubigee Heaton, interviewed by Paula B. Watkins, 18 Oct. 2013, transcript, pp. 50–52, CHL.

      57. [57]Necia P. Seamons, “Purchase Finalized Today of Lands Sacred to the Northwestern Band of Shoshone Nation,” Preston (ID) Citizen, 26 Jan. 2018; Mike Anderson, “Volunteers Help Plant Up to 50,000 Trees This Weekend at the Bear River Massacre Site,” KSL TV, updated 8 Nov. 2025, https://ksltv.com/environment/volunteers-help-plant-up-to-50000-trees-this-weekend-at-the-bear-river-massacre-site/839727/; see also “The Northwestern Shoshone and the Latter-day Saints.”

      58. [58]Isaac E. D. Zundel to John Taylor, 8 Nov. 1886, First Presidency (John Taylor) Correspondence, CHL; Moroni Timbimboo, interview, 9 Dec. 1970, pp. 7–8; see also Christensen, Sagwitch, 184–87.