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Obituary...

published: September 10th 2004

Clyde John Bennett Johnson Jr., a civic leader, rancher, banker and former FBI agent, died Monday, August 23, 2004 at the age of 86. He had Alzheimer’s disease.

The funeral service was held at 11 a.m., August 26 at First Presbyterian Church at 404 N. Alamo Street, San Antonio, Texas.

After receiving a degree in business administration from the University of Texas at Austin and working for short stints at Joske’s of Texas and an accounting firm, Johnson entered the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 1942.

He worked in Washing-ton, D.C., Newark, N.J., and St. Louis before moving to the San Antonio divison office, where he spent the better part of his 26-year FBI career.

Among the high profile cases he worked on were the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas and the case of Julius and Ethel Rosen-berg, the couple executed in 1953 after they were convicted of conspiring to give the Soviet Union secret information about the U.S. atomic bomb.

Johnson retired from the FBI in 1968 and joined Gross National Bank.

He left the bank in 1971 to serve as president and chief executive officer of Alamo Savings Associa-tion. He also served as chairman of the board.

Johnson and his family got into ranching and raising Hereford steers in 1945 after they purchased 16 acres on San Pedro Avenue on what was then the outskirts of San Antonio.

An auto dealership now sits on part of that property.

The San Antonio Stock Show was another reason why they moved to a ranch on U.S. 281 near Bulverde in 1963 and embraced rural life, Johnson said in a 1992 interview with the San Antonio Light newspaper.

“We didn’t know a thing on earth about a bull or steer or a heifer,” he said. “But we did notice that there was sure a nice-looking bunch of clean-cut kids out there showing these heifers.”

The ranching operation Clyde Johnson & Sons, is where the family raises registered Hereford cattle and holds an annual production sale on the third Saturday in October.

This year’s will be the 28th year of the sale.

Always active in civic affairs, Johnson headed the 1978 United Way general campaign. He was past president of the Texas Savings and Loan League and former vice chairman of the executive committe of the Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce.

Johnson is survived by his wife of 63 years, Dorothy Musgrave John-son; three sons, Clyde Johnson III, Mark Johnson and Mike Johnson; 10 grandchildren, Clyde J.B. Johnson IV, Rainey Johnson, Mark M. Johnson Jr., Parker C. Johnson, Michael G. Johnson, W. Sherman Johnson, Jennifer Johnson, A. Cole Cloud, Adrienne Cloud and Christine Cloud; and four great-grandchildren, Kinslee Johnson, Kendall Johnson, Ashley Johnson and William Johnson.

SLS