Todd Johnson dedicated his life to giving back

The former school board member was a longtime high school athletics supporter and a prison minister.

By DEAN SPIROS, Star Tribune

Last update: September 30, 2009 - 9:30 PM

The Burnsville High School football team took the field last week with a special addition to its uniforms. Each Blaze helmet featured a "TJ" sticker in honor of Todd Johnson, a nine-year member of the Burnsville-Eagan-Savage school board who died of cancer Sept. 19 at age 51.

Johnson, whose son Blake plays for the Blaze, was a longtime supporter of athletics during a life dedicated to giving back. The Edina native coached youth sports and served on the Savage Planning Commission before joining the school board. He was appointed to the Minnesota Board of Teaching by Gov. Tim Pawlenty and served for four years. Johnson also was involved in prison ministry.

He worked as a builder and contractor.

"Todd was a very big person, and not just physically,'' said his wife, Diann. "He had a big presence, and ... he leaves a big hole now that he is gone.''

Burnsville-Eagan-Savage school board member Ron Hill, Johnson's close friend, said he was dedicated to help kids in any way he could.

"He was very active in his kids' lives, but he cared about kids in general,'' Hill said. "Todd had a lot of faith, and he carried his Christianity in the forefront.''

Diann Johnson said her husband's work with prison ministry was a calling. Johnson regularly visited with inmates at the Scott County Correctional Facility.

"He used to walk in and joke that he had spent more time in prisons than most of the inmates,'' she said.

Johnson lost in his bid to win a seat in the Minnesota House last fall, failing to unseat DFLer Will Morgan.

"He was excited about the possibility,'' Diann Johnson said of her husband's candidacy. "He enjoyed the process, he loved campaigning. But towards the end he began getting these debilitating headaches. He'd be in bed at one in the afternoon. That just wasn't like him.''

In September 2008, Johnson's brain and liver cancer was diagnosed. Hill said Johnson was confident that he could beat the cancer; he had overcome melanoma 11 years earlier. Hill said his friend stayed emotionally strong until the end.

"We were able to go out to dinner two months ago,'' Hill said. "He was walking with the help of a cane. The last 30 days, he pretty much had to stay home. A number of people visited him, right up to the day he passed.''

Along with his wife, Johnson is survived by two daughters, Jennifer (David) Taylor and Rachel; three sons, Blake, Brandon and Ryan; a brother, Bruce Johnson, and a sister, Michelle Johnson.

Services have been held.

Dean Spiros • 952-882-9203

Recent Obituaries stories

Music at the State Fair will never be the same again - September 30, 2009

Music at the State Fair will never be the same again - Ray Komischke was a consummate musician who played at the State Fair, ran a music contracting business and "put his heart and soul into everything he did." More

Deaths elsewhere - September 30, 2009

Deaths elsewhere - Ray Browne, 87, an Ohio university professor who was credited with coining the phrase "popular culture" and pioneering the study of things such as bumper stickers and cartoons, died at his home in Toledo. He developed the first academic department devoted to studying what he called the "people's culture" at Bowling Green in 1973. Browne wrote and edited more than 70 books on popular culture -- including "The Guide to United States Popular Culture," published in 2001. While many in the field credit Browne with coming up with the name "popular culture," no one could say for sure whether he originated it. He said he made a mistake in 1967 when he first used the phrase. "If I had called it everyday culture or Democratic culture, it would not have been so sharply criticized," he said. Browne worked for decades to convince academics that much could be learned from studying seemingly insignificant elements of our lives. Professors at universities nationwide thought Browne, an English professor, was trying to demean or trivialize what they were teaching when he founded the popular culture department. That wasn't the case, he said. His interest was rooted in finding out how society affects culture and how culture affects society. His interests ranged from cowboy movies to wallpaper. "The covering of walls has been one of the most important items in housing since the beginning," he said. "But nobody ever wrote a book on it." Browne taught at the University of Maryland and Purdue University before moving to Bowling Green. AP More