Harris Johnson

One day in March 2006 I learned of the death of my first cousin Hillyer Harris Johnson, Jr., at his home in Leesburg, FL, on March 4. He had been born December 12, 1923, in Washington, Georgia. His sister Vohammie called me Friday night to tell me that she and her two daughters, Lillian and Vohammie, had gone from their homes in North Carolina for the funeral in Leesburg on March 10. Harris and I had been close all our lives. Our fathers were brothers so we were first cousins. My great aunt, Elizabeth Sims Smith, widow of my great uncle, Raymond Smith, was to conduct a kindergarten upstairs in Harris's new house. We both attended, together with our cousin Mary Elizabeth Johnson, Lelia Cheney, Adelaide Wood, Sarah Oslin, Osborne Bounds, Jack Jackson, and James Blackmon. We all continued in school together until graduation in 1941. I was a better student than Harris, but he had an ability that I admired greatly - he was a great athlete. He was quarterback of our senior football team in 1940 that was not scored on and gained 269 points to none. We roomed together at Presbyterian College 1941-1942; went into the Army the same day, June 15, 1943; came back together in October 1943 at Mississippi State College; and went to OCS together in February 1944. We both failed to get commissioned at first, but Harris was permitted to try again and succeeded. He went to Panama and was in command of the narrow-gauge railroad service in the zone. We got out of the Army about the same time. I finished college at Presbyterian, but Harris transferred to the University of Georgia and earned a degree in landscape gardening, which he used in getting into landscaping in Leesburg, FL. He married a college-mate, had two sons, and ran a thriving business. I saw him about once a year while he was in Florida. We were both in Kiwanis and both went to the convention in Seattle in 1988. I rented a car there and Harris and I and our wives toured the area where Harris had served during the war.