Viola Harriette Erickson

Viola was born on a farm in Nebraska but moved at an early age to the Yakima area where her folks were orchardists for many years. She is a graduate of Selah High School, Yakima Valley Junior College and the University of Washington (in 1940), where she was an education major.

She married Melvin R. Johnson, a young Seattle banker, later that year and eventually became an elementary school teacher. She taught in Woodinville and Moses Lake before teaching at the former Sunset School in Shoreline. She was widowed in 1967 and married Joe, the school district’s painting superintendent, five years later.

For most of her life, Viola was an accomplished pianist. Among other interests were a life-long love of horses and, since an early retirement 45 years ago, traveling domestically (to all 50 states) and Europe. She and Joe at various times lived in California, East Wenatchee, Leavenworth and Tacoma in addition to Seattle and Edmonds.

Viola and Joe were members of the Berean Bible Church in Shoreline. Graveside services for the family were held at Acacia in Seattle.

Viola is survived by Bruce and Frankie Johnson, son and daughter-in-law; Eric (Shawn Rogers) Johnson, grandson; Karen (Jim) Fisker-Andersen, granddaughter; and great-grandchildren Kiersten (Jonah) Simon, Jacob Fisker-Andersen and Lauren Johnson.

Joe’s survivors are Judy Erickson and Jeannie Bond, daughters; Jim Erickson and Mark Bond, grandsons; Michele Erickson, Lisa (John) Mize and Heidi Townsend, granddaughters; and great-grandchildren Jordan and Jaeden Bond and Jennika (Michael) Blumlein; Andrew, Jacob, Tybrina and Carter Taylor, and Kayla (Loden) Johnson-Taylor; and Loren Townsend, and great-great-granddaughter Key-Lo Townsend.

Private graveside services were held at Acacia in Seattle.

YOUR NOTES ABOUT YOUR HISTORY

I was born on November 23, 1917 in the family farmhouse in Clay County, southeastern Nebraska as the only child to Harry and Rose. On the farm, we had a few horses, some cows and other livestock, mainly pigs. Unfortunately, Daddy had some bad coughing spells and could hardly breathe at times. The doctor told him he had to move out west where it was dry if he wanted to have a long life. So, when I was 3, we took a trip in our touring car to California, Utah and eastern Washington.

One place we looked was the small town of Selah, near Yakima. Outside of Selah was a fruit ranch, mainly apples, that was owned by two brothers, both attorneys, back home in Nebraska. They needed someone to manage the fruit ranch, and Daddy decided that was something he could do. While visiting this place, Daddy’s health problem went away, so at the age of 3 I moved from Nebraska to Washington state.

The 40-acre ranch had a large house and other buildings, including a warehouse where the fruit was packed and stored. There was plenty of room for our horse (I was put on horseback in Nebraska as well) and mules for pulling the wagon. My life-long love of horses truly began when I was 1 year old! I also enjoyed watching Daddy milk our cow. And I loved my dolls. I lined them all up so I could teach them or have church with them.

About 15 years after moving to Washington, Daddy and Mama bought their own fruit ranch, also outside of Selah, which they operated until Daddy’s retirement in 1956. During those years, we did lots of camping and fishing on the east side of the Cascade mountains with neighbors and we were active in the First Christian Church of Yakima where we had lots of friends and large potluck Sunday gatherings at various homes on ranches and in town. While we were still on the big ranch, I remember my folks’ large Sunday School class every year coming to our place to play in the snow and have a chili feed. I also remember Grandma and Grandpa coming out from Nebraska in the summers to help make boxes for the apples. I helped make boxes too.

Also when I was growing up, I started taking piano lessons at the age of 6 and continued to play the piano until just recently. While in Selah High School, I did piano solos and taught piano for four or five students in their homes and had a small recital for them. During my two years in Yakima Valley Junior College, I was active as a piano accompanist for a men’s quartet. I also sang in the church choir, including doing duets with an uncle.

After graduating from junior college, I enrolled at the University of Washington where I lived in a dorm. I graduated from there in 1940 with a degree in education. But I didn’t become a teacher then because I married Melvin Johnson of Seattle. And in late 1941, I gave birth to Bruce, our only child. We lived mostly in Seattle but also in Everson, near the Canadian border, and in Moses Lake.

My teaching career began in 1955 in Woodinville, where I taught third grade for two school years. That was followed by another two school years of teaching in Moses Lake. After returning to Seattle, I taught third and fourth grades for another 16 school years in the Shoreline School District, all of that time at Sunset School in the Innis Arden neighborhood.

My first husband died in 1967 and I remained single for five years. During this time, in 1970, my folks sent me and a childhood friend Doris Fairbrook on a fabulous trip to Europe that included a visit to the Austrian home of the Royal Lipizzan Stallions. Two years later, on November 17, 1972, I was married to Claire (Joe) Erickson of Seattle in the Yakima home of my parents by a long-time family friend, the Rev. Jim Fairbrook (husband of Doris). I met Joe at Sunset School, where he and his school district painting crew was at work. It was a joke among the staff that my room got a lot of repainting! Four years later, in 1976, we both retired, me after 21 calendar years of teaching. Following our retirement, we did lots of traveling in Europe and in all 50 states of our country as well as in Canada. During this time, we lived in several places besides Seattle, including the Lodi area of central California and East Wenatchee, Leavenworth and Edmonds in Washington. We also spent a number of winters down south, mostly in California (mainly Pismo Beach) as well as Lake Havasu, Arizona.

In 1997, we moved permanently to an Edmonds condo, where we observed our 40th wedding anniversary on November 17, 2012. Only two months later, Joe passed away after being diagnosed four months earlier with pancreatic cancer. I chose to remain in the condo for another year, during which time I had a marvelous six-week visit with son Bruce and daughter-in-law Frankie in their Arizona winter home. In early 2014, I moved into a spacious apartment at Ida Culver Broadview with a gorgeous view of Puget Sound and the Olympic Mountains. In 2017, I “downsized” again when I moved into Rosewood Courte back in Edmonds, where I celebrated my 100th birthday, which was on Thanksgiving Day that year. And in March 2019, I moved to the Shoreline care home of Ashford Lake Ballinger.