Betty Marie Johnson Barnett

Betty Marie Johnson Barnett

Dec. 12, 1924 - June 18, 2023

NAPA - Betty Marie Johnson was born December 12, 1924 in Highwood, Illinois to Birger Alexius and Jennette Amelia Johnson. She had an older brother, Roy Winfield, and later a younger brother John Gordon. The family lived on a farm in St. Charles, IL where her father worked as a master carpenter. After a few years they moved to a dairy farm that her father built on the site of a stage coach stop in Lily Lake, IL. Betty graduated from St. Charles High School in the spring of 1942 and enrolled in the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, studying Physical Education and Recreation. One summer break, she worked at an airplane parts factory in St. Charles, making airplane propellers.

She met Emmett Wilkes Perkins, also from Illinois, at the university after he returned from war. They were married in 1947. Emmett finished his studies in advertising and they moved to Chicago, where their first daughter, Susan Jean, was born in 1951. A year later, while in Cresskill, New Jersey, the second daughter Carol Ann was born. When Emmett was transferred to Los Angeles, Betty travelled cross country alone by car with her two daughters. It was the first of many traveling adventures she would have. Her son, John Eric, was born in Los Angeles in 1957. Her marriage to Emmett ended the next year, leaving her with two young daughters and an infant son to support and raise on her own when he moved back to New Jersey. Although all her family was in the midwest, Betty chose to stay and create a life in Reseda, a suburb of Los Angeles.

Using her college degree, Betty became an elementary teacher for the Los Angeles Unified School District. Because she had the same school breaks and holidays as her children, there was time for travel in the summer. She bravely took her three small children on the train from Los Angeles to Chicago to visit family in Illinois. Her income did not allow for a sleeper car or many meals in the dining car, instead the family slept in their seats and ate from a picnic hamper. The children remember it as a grand adventure! The trip to Illinois would be repeated several times over the years. There was a brief marriage to Daniel O'Donnell in 1963 (she learned to bowl).

California was her true love and she started exploring the state when the kids were very little. The budget and the preferred destinations meant they went car camping. Other campers were stunned when this (very attractive) young woman, with no man around, would set up camp for three young kids. Most summer camping trips started early in the morning, before sunrise, and the family either headed north up Hwy 101, or east toward Las Vegas and beyond. All vacations became educational adventures with camping in National and State Parks, and stops to read just about every Historical Marker on the road. The family experienced sunrises over the Grand Canyon, the firefalls in Yosemite Valley, run ins with bears and other wildlife, and some hiking around Crater Lake. There was river rafting in the Grand Tetons, and misadventures with small geysers in Yellowstone. One of Betty's interests was geology, and on these trips she pointed out interesting geological formations and landscapes, always in her "teacher mode." On weekends, Betty would fill her station wagon with her children and their friends and head over to the beach.

These trips of historical nature helped her gain credits with her continued studies. She took night classes at the local colleges, mostly in education, geology, and art. Receiving her Masters degree in Education, she was granted a salary increase. A small inheritance from her father allowed her to invest in real estate. Her favorite property purchase was a condominium on the beach in Carpinteria which she kept until her death.

Betty retired from teaching after twenty years and married Earl Barnett in 1977 (she learned golf and bridge). The marriage ended after nine years and Betty moved to Napa, California to be near her first grandchild, Samuel Poole and his mother, Carol. There, she renewed her interest in painting and travel. She painted nearly every day and had a small studio in the old Sawyer Tannery. She was the woman in the big sun hat, sitting in her beach chair at the local art shows in the park. She was a docent for the Carolyn Parr Nature Museum and the diRosa Preserve. She traveled to Europe and Mexico a few times and toured China with her school colleague soon after it was opened up to western tourists. She participated in a number of Elderhostel trips, including a history tour of Boston, art classes in Maine and a stay in Abiquiu, New Mexico to study geology and the art of Georgia O'Keeffe.

After two bouts with Non-Hodgkins lymphoma, Betty spent her later years quietly in her home with her books, her art projects and a succession of cats. Her final years were spent at Stayman Estates in Napa where she received loving professional care. Betty died on June 18, 2023.

She is survived by her younger brother, John G. Johnson (Walter Galloway) of Florida, daughter Susan Jean (Doug) Cushing of Portland, Ore., daughter Carol Ann Perkins Poole (John Oesleby) of Napa, son John Eric (Linda) Perkins of Carlisle, Iowa, and grandchildren Sam, Ashley and Kelsey. Her ashes will be interred in Tulocay Cemetery in Napa, CA.