John J. Martin’s mother and father were married in 1873 and the family moved to Grand Forks, North Dakota in 1880. Martin’s father then headed west and worked for the Blackfoot Indian Agency teaching Indigenous people how to plough with oxen, cut crops with a cradle, and thresh with a flail. In 1885 Martin’s mother joined her husband in Cluny, North West Territory, and then the family moved in 1888 to a homestead in Gleichen, Alberta.

John J. Martin was born in 1888 in Gleichen. He first attended school in 1895 and was taught by John Robert Boyle who was later elected to the first Alberta Legislature in 1905. In 1897 the family moved to a different homestead located in Rosebud, Alberta and in 1910 Martin moved back to Gleichen where he had a job on the Siksika First Nation Reservation issuing rations, patrolling the property line to keep the Siksika cattle on the reserve, and cooking for the Indian Department riders. In 1913 Martin returned to Rosebud to take up ranching.