Chadron State College Athletic Hall of Fame
Johnson was four days shy of his 90th birthday when he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. He was born in Canada on Oct. 12, 1915, and graduated from Rushville High School in 1934 and from Chadron State in 1942 with a degree in physics. Johnson spent three years in the Army in the South Pacific during World War II. In the 1950s, he and his wife, the former Beth Rogers in Rapid City, S.D., who earned a teaching certificate at CSC, purchased a store on the Spirit Lake Indian Reservation in North Dakota. They operated the store for 20 years and was the postmaster at Fort Totten, N.D., for 28 years. He lived at Devils Lake, N.D., when he was inducted.
Johnson played center on offense and linebacker on defense for the CSC football team four years, earning all-conference recognition at least twice. He was a co-captain his senior year. He was a campus leader, serving as the president of both the Junior Class and Blue Key National Honor Fraternity, was a member of the Student Council, an officer of Psi Beta Sigma Fraternity and was selected to Who’s Who. He was still going strong at age 93 when this was written.
