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Date: 10/6/2021
SOUTHWICK – Living in town since she was a teenager, 91-year-old Mabel Johnson has seen many parades in Southwick. One of her favorites is the 1970 parade celebrating the town’s 200th birthday.
“What I remember most about that parade is all the beautiful floats in it,” she said of the bicentennial parade.
Now she’s looking forward to the Southwick 250 Grand Parade, to take place Oct. 16. The parade is part of a town-wide celebration to remember the historic occasion in November 1770 when Southwick won its independence from Westfield.
The parade celebrating the town’s founding was originally planned for 2020, but it was delayed for a year because of the pandemic.
Johnson said it’s important for the town to hold these special celebrations to reflect on its history. “We tend to forget too much of our past and all the people who came before us. These celebrations are a way to remember them and the work people did for Southwick that many of us take for granted today.”
Johnson, who has called Southwick home for nearly 80 years, was born in Westfield in 1930. She had just graduated from junior high school when her family relocated from the city in 1943. She was no stranger to Southwick, since her family often summered there “in the country.”
Once she moved into town, she never left. She fell in love in Southwick. She got married there. She and her husband built their house there and raised three children in that home. She began her teaching career there and her husband joined Southwick’s volunteer Fire Department while working as a truck mechanic in town.
She and her husband, Howard “Howie” Johnson, took numerous trips across the United States, but were always “happy to come home” to Southwick.
“We had our ups and downs, but we enjoyed our life here,” she said.
Now a grandmother and a great-grandmother, she’s also a survivor. Johnson, the youngest of six children, outlived her five older brothers and her husband, who died at age 94 in 2019. Two years ago, she dealt with the untimely death of a granddaughter. Then, this past May, her daughter died.
Despite her recent losses, Johnson, a woman with a strong religious faith, remains upbeat and continues to lead an active life in Southwick. She’s an active member of the Living Hope Church, volunteers for town organizations, such as the Historical Society, attends town activities, and still drives her car regularly.
Additionally, Johnson spends time with her two other adult children — one in Southwick and the other in South Carolina — both in-person and virtually. She’s also close with her three remaining grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Johnson, who lived on Mort Vining Road with her family, has many fond memories of “a great many adventures” growing up in Southwick.
She loved to go swimming with her friends at Miller’s Beach on South Pond. Johnson recalls that they would often walk through the woods near her house as a shortcut to College Highway. Then they would make their way to Congamond Road to get to the beach.
Johnson was bused to Westfield High School for four years, since Southwick was still years away from having its own high school. When snowstorms closed schools, she remembers walking with her father to buy milk and bread at a nearby gas station with a small store.
“Sometimes, the snow was up to my knees, but we always made it there and back,” she recalled.
One winter, when Congamond Lake was frozen solid, she rode with her father as he drove the length of Middle Pond from Congamond Road to Point Grove Road.
“I was scared to death. I was afraid our car would fall through the ice. But it was an adventure and a half,” she recalled.
Following her high school graduation in 1947, Johnson was accepted into the teaching program at what was then called Westfield State Teachers College.
But instead of returning to the college in the fall of 1948, she got married. Johnson had met her future husband while roller skating at Babb’s Beach – one of her favorite hangouts.
In 1951, two weeks after her 21st birthday, Johnson gave birth to the first of three children, two boys and a girl. Two years later, their second child was born. They also moved into a newly built ranch house that same year.
“Howie’s uncle owned a construction company that was building new houses near the center of town. His uncle’s crew built our house after we paid $500 to buy the last lot on what was then just a dirt path,” said Johnson, who still lives in that house.
Johnson had her third child in 1955, putting on pause on her plans to return to college so she could start a teaching career. Several years later, she finally went back to finish her courses, and made the dean’s list in each of her final three years.
It was a major achievement for her when she graduated from Westfield State College in 1962. She was graduated cum laude – second highest in her class scholastically. That fall, Johnson began teaching fourth grade at the Consolidated School, the building that now houses the Town Hall and the Senior Center.
Her teaching career in Southwick was short-lived. In September 1966, Johnson accepted a teaching position in Longmeadow. It was the start of a nearly 30-year career in that town that lasted until her retirement in 1995 at age 65.
“I wasn’t unhappy teaching in Southwick, but teachers were paid more in Longmeadow and had better benefits,” she said of her decision to leave Consolidated School. “I was a little scared about applying in Longmeadow, because of its ‘upper-crust’ reputation.”
Although Johnson loved teaching in Longmeadow, she never considered moving there. Southwick was where she still wanted to live.
When Johnson moved to Southwick, it was still a very rural community. Most of the homes on the lake were still just summer “cottages,” and farming was the big business. The only set of traffic lights was in the center of town.
During her nearly eight decades in Southwick, she’s watched the town flourish with more families, more homes, and more businesses. For Johnson, however, Southwick still has the beauty and charm that she enjoys.
“Looking out my window, I can see the large, white Congregational Church in the center of town,” she said. “When I see that church, it reminds me that despite all the changes that have happened, I’m still living in a small New England town.”