Johnson, Dr. Warford B. Sr. 1914-1999

JOHNSON, WARFORD, TINDALL

Posted By: Linda Ziemann, volunteer (email)
Date: 7/24/2007 at 22:09:43

DR. WARFORD B. JOHNSON, SR.

SPRINGFIELD, Mo.--- Dr. Warford Burdette Johnson Sr., 84, of Springfield, Mo., died Thursday, Sept. 16, 1999, at his home following a lengthy illness.

Dr. Johnson was born Dec. 7, 1914, in Wellsville, Kan., the son of the Rev. Luther Ray and Martha (Warford) Johnson. He graduated from Augusta, Kan., High School. He attended Ottawa University in Kansas where he met his future wife, Florence Edith Tindall of LeMars, and graduated from the University of Kansas in 1938. The couple were married in Chicago on Sept. 5, 1936, by his father. He received his doctorate of medicine degree from Northwestern University, Chicago, in 1943. Their daughter, Karen Lee, was born Dec. 17, 1942, in Chicago, and their son, Warford B. II, was born on July 14, 1944, during Dr. Johnson’s internal medicine residency at Henry Ford Hospital.

Dr. Johnson practiced in Wichita, Kan., for four years, then served as chief of medicine at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Big Spring, Texas. While passing through Springfield, Mo., in 1950, he fell in love with the community, and moved his family there in 1951. He practiced internal medicine for the next 35 years, retiring in 1985.

Dr. Johnson was on the active staff at Cox Health Systems, and served on all its medical committees and as chief of staff. He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and Alpha Omega Alpha, a Fellow of the American College of Physicians, and a member of the Green County Medical Society and the Missouri State Medical Association. He was also a member of Covenant Presbyterian Church.

He loved art and was an accomplished sculptor, painter and photographer. He loved science and inquiry, and reading a book on quantum physics at the time of his death. He loved horticulture, hunting, fishing, aviation, philosophy, geology, astronomy and debate. Most of all, he loved his patients, his friends and his family.

Survivors include his children, Karen Lee Vahl, Edmonton, Canada, and Warford II and his wife, Jane Ann, of Springfield, Mo.; his grandsons, Warford Johnson III, Houston, Texas, Ian Andrew Johnson, Springfield, Mo., Christopher Michael Vahl, Edmonton, Canada, and Corey Stephen Vahl, Seward, Neb.; a sister, Margaret Maxine Hyde; brothers, Richard Neumann Johnson and his wife, Dorothy, and Robert Leland Johnson and his wife, Gwynne, all of Wichita, Kan., and Dana Frances Johnson, Newton, Kan.; a sister-in-law, Artie Mae (Mrs. Erdman) Johnson in Connecticut; and many nieces and nephews.

He was preceded in death by his wife of 54 years, Florence; a brother, Erdman Harris Johnson; and a son-in-law, the Rev. Ronald W. Vahl.

Memorial services were held at 2 p.m. Sunday in First and Calvary Presbyterian Church in Springfield, with Dr. Gary D. Stratman officiating. Committal services and burial will be at 3 p.m. today (Monday) in Pleasant Valley Cemetery, Adaville, rural Merrill. There will be no visitation. The Gorman-Scharpf Brentwood Funeral Home of Springfield is in charge of arrangements.

~source: LeMars Sentinel