Richard Lee Johnston

Mr. Johnston was born in 1929 in Kankakee, Ill, the youngest of five siblings, and raised in Kankakee, where he was captain of the high school football team and class valedictorian. He followed in his father’s footsteps to attend Northwestern University as an undergraduate.

He was attending Northwestern University Law School in 1951 when he met a pretty young nurse named Mary Reynders on the Chicago Loop on New Year’s Eve. He asked her, “Are you going my way?” She replied, “Which way are you going?” They would go the same way through 67 years of marriage from June of 1952 until she predeceased him in 2019. They had a daughter, the late Kathreen (Kay) Johnston in March of 1953 and a son Richard (Kay’s “Irish twin”) in 1954, followed in the next five years by son Mark and daughter Carolyn. They would eventually have seven grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Dick’s life was all about service: he was a Boy Scout leader, and took an active role in his children’s education to the extent of running for and winning election to the Mountain Lakes, N. J. school board. Later, he would be the pro bono lawyer of the year in Dallas, where he had relocated for his job.

Dick and Mary followed their two daughters and four of their grandchildren to San Francisco in 1998. In San Francisco, he led a very active life of service: helping build homes for Habitat for Humanity in Visitacion Valley; doing pro bono tax preparation for the IRS; painting over graffiti in the Western Addition; picking up trash all over the Western Addition every day; and volunteering to help the homeless at the Gubbio Project in San Francisco’s Tenderloin.

He combined an active lifestyle with his life of service. His oldest grandchild, Lauren Schellinger, recalls a visit to San Francisco in 1999 when she was trying to get in running shape for soccer tryouts. Mr. Johnston went on a run with her around Lake Merced and brought a trash bag with him. “He both outran me and picked up half a bag of trash,” she remembers.

He constantly helped his daughters Kay and Carolyn with work around their houses. His son-in-law Leslie Timpe remembers Kay Johnston saying, “let’s find something for my Dad to do and invite them down. He loves that.” So he helped with painting, installing shelves, latching bookcases to the wall in case of earthquakes, and many other projects. He also helped his daughter Carolyn with gardening and house projects into his 90s, taking Muni to get to her house. He was also a runner into his 60s, and even in the last year of his life he would hike from the Sequoias on Cathedral Hill to Fort Mason, and take the bus back. He had a beautiful singing voice and sang in the choir at St. Mary’s Cathedral.

Mr. Johnston was predeceased by his wife of 67 years, Mary, and by his daughter Dr. Kathreen (Kay) Johnston, a brilliant and beautiful San Francisco geneticist. He is survived by sons Dr. Mark Johnston (Cathy) of Buffalo, N.Y.; Richard (Myriam) Johnston of Vienna, Va.; and daughter Carolyn Johnston (Karl Olson) of San Francisco. He had seven grandchildren: Lauren Schellinger) (Kevin) of Williamsville, N.Y.; Bridget Johnston (Dr. Emily Carroll) of New York, N.Y.; Clara Timpe (Josh Echols) of San Francisco; Robert Timpe (Dr. Jordan Taylor) of San Francisco; Daniela Johnston Carter (Danny) of Boulder, Colo.; Mark Olson of San Francisco; and Jack Olson of San Francisco. He is also survived by three great-grandchildren and numerous nieces and nephews.

Services will be held on Thursday, December 14 at 10:30 a.m. at St. Dominic’s Church, 2390 Bush St. at the corner of Bush and Steiner in San Francisco.