Ziba Peterson

Ziba Peterson (died 1849) was an early American Latter Day Saint best known as one of the four initial missionaries sent by Joseph Smith in 1830 to preach to Native Americans in Indian Territory. This mission brought in several influential converts and introduced the church to Kirtland, Ohio and Jackson County, Missouri, which would become religiously significant to Mormonism.

Peterson was baptized into the Church of Christ (Latter Day Saints) by Oliver Cowdery on April 18, 1830 in Seneca Lake, New York. By June 1830 he had been ordained an elder. Peterson was one of six elders attending the church's first conference on June 9, 1830.

Peterson was called as a missionary to the Native Americans (referred to as Lamanites by early Mormons) in Indian Territory with Parley P. Pratt, Oliver Cowdery and Peter Whitmer, and left Fayette, New York on October 17, 1830. On this journey, they went through Kirtland, Ohio where they met a Reformed Baptist pastor friend of Pratt's, Sidney Rigdon. From their preaching, about 50 converts were baptized, including Rigdon, who became an important early leader of the Latter Day Saints. This early success in Kirtland led it to become a crucial gathering place for early Mormons, the headquarters of the church, and the place of the church's first temple.

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