mooney] SKETCH OF WOVOKA 7G5 



is a narrow strip of level sage prairie some 3<> miles in length, walled 

 in by the giant sierras, their sides torn and gashed l>y volcanic con 

 vulsions and dark with gloomy forests of pine, their towering summits 

 white with everlasting snows, and roofed over by a cloudless sky whose 

 blue infinitude the mind instinctively seeks to penetrate to far-off 

 worlds beyond. Away to the south the view is closed in by the sacred 

 mountain of the Paiute, where their Father gave them the first lire 

 and taught them their few simple arts before leaving for his home in 

 the upper regions of the Sun-land. Like the valley of Kasselas, it 

 seems set apart from the great world to be the home of a dreamer. 



The greater portion of Nevada is an arid desert of rugged mountains 

 and alkali plains, the little available land being confined to narrow 

 mountain valleys and the borders of a few large lakes. These tracts 

 are occupied by scattered ranchmen engaged in stock raising, and as 

 the white population is sparse, Indian labor is largely utilized, the 

 Paiute being very good workers. The causes which in other parts of 

 the country have conspired to sweep the Indian from the path of the 

 white man seem inoperative here, where the aboriginal proprietors are 

 regarded rather as peons under the protection of the dominant race, 

 and are allowed to set up their small camps of tule lodges in convenient 

 out-of-the-way places, where they spend the autumn and winter in hunt- 

 ing, fishing, and gathering seeds and pinon nuts, working at fair wages 

 en ranches through spring and summer. In this way young Wovoka 

 became attached to the family of a ranchman in Mason valley, named 

 David Wilson, who took an interest in him and bestowed on him the 

 name of Jack Wilson, by which he is commonly known among the 

 whites. From his association with this family he gained some knowl- 

 edge of English, together with a confused idea of the white man's 

 theology. On growing up he married, and still continued to work for 

 Mr Wilson, earning a reputation for industry and reliability, but attract- 

 ing no special notice until nearly 30 years of age, when he announced 

 the revelation that has made him famous among the tribes of the west. 



Following are the various forms of his name which I have noticed: 

 Wo'voka, or Wii'voka. which I have provisionally lendered ''Cutter," 

 derived from a verb signifying "to cut;" Wevokar, Wopokahte, 

 Kwohitsauq, Cowejo, Koit-tsow, Kvit-Tsow, Quoitze Ow, Jack Wilson, 

 Jackson Wilson, Jack Winson, John Johnson. lie has also been con- 

 founded with Bannock Jim, a Mormon Bannock of Fort Hall reserva- 

 tion, Idaho, and with Johnson Sides, a Paiute living near Reno, Nevada, 

 and bitterly opposed to Wovoka. His father's name, Tlivibo, has been 

 given also as Waughzeewaughber. It is not quite certain that the 

 Paiute prophet of 1870 was the father of Wovoka. This is stated to 

 have been the ease by one of Captain Lee's informants (J. <!. 0., I) 

 and by Lieutenant Phister {Phister, :.'). Wovoka himself says that his 

 father did not preach, but was a "dreamer" with supernatural powers. 

 Certain it is that a similar doctrine was taught by an Indian living in 



