John Wilson was born in Ohio in 1813 and survived removal from Ohio to Kansas in the 1830s.

Wilson served in tribal leadership in the 1850s, and he was elected chief in 1865, during a period of great uncertainty for the Ottawa Tribe. An 1862 treaty called for the allotment or sale of Ottawa lands in Kansas and endowed land to establish Ottawa University. Corrupt federal and university officials defrauded the Ottawas of their lands and educational rights, and Chief Wilson led the effort to expose these abuses. His actions to protect Ottawa interests and secure a new homeland spared his people from widespread destitution and dispossession in Kansas.

Faced with tribal dispossession in Kansas, Wilson negotiated with the Shawnees for the purchase of 14,863 acres of their reservation in Indian Territory, and this purchase was confirmed in an 1867 treaty. Wilson never got to reside in the new homeland he established. He died unexpectedly in April 1870 on the journey from Kansas to Indian Territory. His family carried his body the rest of the way, and he became the first person interred in what later became known as the Ottawa Indian Cemetery.