Turning 106, Sioux Falls woman is center of her neighborhood

By Jill Callison, for Pigeon605

When Berneice and Andy Johnson selected Sioux Falls as their retirement home, they weren’t the first to settle in their chosen neighborhood.

Bob and Sherry Sorensen had moved in a couple of years earlier, as had Ken and Barb Buchanan. At the time, they probably were most pleased that a weed-covered eyesore of a lot was going to be turned into a lawn that would match their own.

In the 43 years since Berneice Johnson designed her house on that corner lot in south Sioux Falls, a lot has changed. The thrum of nearby 41^st Street traffic increased over the years as the road became one of the most heavily traveled in South Dakota. The neighborhood itself, though, remains supremely residential, and it coalesces around one tiny woman. Johnson may not be a lifetime Sioux Falls resident. At 106 she may not even be the city’s oldest resident. She is, however, one of its proudest residents.

“With the help of the Lord, He planted us on this corner, and it’s the best place in the whole city of Sioux Falls,” Johnson said. “Very wonderful people live around here.”

Those neighbors joined her on Sunday when she celebrated her 106^th birthday in a gathering that included friends she made from her 37 years as a volunteer for Sanford Health, first educating people who arrived to donate blood, then soothing anxious family members in the ICU waiting room.

That’s how Nona Bixler, director of volunteer services for Sanford USD Medical Center, met Johnson. They’ve known each other for almost 40 years.

“She wanted to quit when she was 98,” Bixler said, and Johnson’s service in the blood bank no longer was needed. “I said, you’re not quitting. We can use you as a hostess in the ICU waiting room.”

Mayor Paul Ten Haken honored Evelyn Burggraff with a house visit and proclamation in April when she turned 105. At 106, Johnson might be the oldest Sioux Falls resident, he suggested during his visit to her house Friday, but she demurred. Her doctor, she says, said he has an older patient, although she doesn’t know where that person lives.

Ten Haken had issued a proclamation on Johnson’s 105^th birthday in 2020, but this year he could read it to her in person. It highlighted her birth as Berneice Reid near Gruver, Iowa, east of Spirit Lake, on July 11, 1915, her marriage to the late Andrew “Andy” Johnson, and her years as a public-school teacher.

She taught elementary school grades for 42 years in six different Iowa school districts, retiring after 42 years. Her children are the “thousands and thousands” who walked through her classroom doors, Johnson says.

Andy Johnson, who died in 2001, was a barber. They lived in Sioux City, Iowa, for two years after they both retired but didn’t really like the community. Despite not knowing anyone in Sioux Falls, Berneice Johnson says she was inspired one day to suggest that the couple should move there.

To meet people, they started attending the senior citizen center, then downtown. That’s when Andy Johnson began his second career. The center needed a temporary barber, and he took the position, keeping it when his predecessor died.

Berneice Johnson first kept herself busy designing their new house. After years of the couple jostling for space while combing hair and brushing their teeth, she told Andy, “I don’t care if we have a kitchen or a bedroom, but we’re having two bathrooms.” Then she began her volunteer activities.

She also grew to know and love her neighborhood and the people who live there.

You won’t be surprised to learn it’s mutual.

“She’s fantastic,” Sherry Sorensen said. “She’s pleasant and so thoughtful. She admires my roses, so I pick them and give them to her. She puts them in the refrigerator overnight to keep them fresh. When I want to give her more, she protests.”

Bob Sorensen has removed snow from Johnson’s sidewalk for years, but on days of lighter snowfall, she would grab a broom and remove the powder from their walk. Johnson is a familiar site in the neighborhood as she crosses the street to a nearby park and walks the bases of a baseball diamond on all but the windiest of days.

“I tell you, there’s a lot of gas left in your tank,” Ten Haken told her admiringly. Without missing a beat, she retorted, “At $3 a gallon!”

In 1976, Johnson led her Hawarden elementary-school pupils in burying a time capsule during the nation’s celebration of its Bicentennial. She scheduled its opening for 50 years so her students, who would then be in their 60s, could be there for its opening.

Maybe, just maybe, she can be there too. The items were put in a sewer pipe that was soldered shut, wrapped in tinfoil, and decorated in red and blue ribbons.

“It should be in pretty good shape,” Johnson said, wistfully. “I wish I could be there. It should be fun.”

Five more years to go.