Wilmer "Cracker" Johnson Jr 1923 - 2002

JOHNSON, WORTHMAN, MACKEY

Posted By: Connie Swearingen-Volunteer (email)
Date: 5/18/2016 at 12:58:55

Sioux City Journal
3 October 2002

Wilmer "Cracker" Johnson Jr., 79, of Sioux City died Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2002, at a Sioux City hospital.

Services will be 10 a.m. Friday at Meyer Brothers Colonial Chapel, with the Rev. Merrill Muller officiating. Burial will be in Calvary Cemetery, with military rites conducted by Veterans of Foreign Wars Schull Post 580. Visitation will be 3 to 9 p.m. today, with the family present 7 to 9 p.m., at the funeral home.

Mr. Johnson was born July 12, 1923, in Hudson, S.D., the son of Wilmer H. and Anna (Worthman) Johnson. He lived in Hudson before coming to Sioux City in 1946. He served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II. He had also boxed on the Army team during the war, where he had a record of 54 and three.

He married Betty Ann Mackey on April 14, 1950, in Mountain Home, Ark. He retired as a concrete foreman from Ebasco. Mrs. Johnson died Feb. 11, 1991, in Sioux City.

He was a member of Labor Union Local 427 and Veterans of Foreign Wars Schull Post 580. He also was a member and past governor of the Moose Lodge. He coached slow pitch softball and was an avid fisherman and hunter.

Survivors include two sons, Rex Johnson of Key West, Fla., and Wilmer Lee Johnson of Sioux City; a daughter and her husband, Debbie and Randy Winter of Sioux City; five grandchildren, Shawn Winter and his wife, Traci, of Sioux City, Nate Winter of Sioux City, Vanessa Johnson of Milford, Iowa, Nicki Johnson of Milford and Dustin Weise of Memphis, Tenn.; a great-granddaughter, Allison Winter of Sioux City; three brothers, Vernon Johnson of Sloan, Iowa, Ernest Johnson and his wife, Laura, of Sioux City and Richard Johnson and his wife, Lois, of Texas; a sister, Marian Decker of Texas; and a special friend, Mary Cadwell of Sioux City.

In addition to his wife, he was also preceded in death by a son, Delbert; his parents; a sister, Evelyn Kempema; and a brother, Russell Johnson.

Pallbearers will be Shawn and Nate Winter, Jerry Kempema, Jim Foster, Darrell Anderson and Keith Jensen.