Dorothy Ella Johnston 1922-2025

Nobody is immortal. Not even my aunt Dorothy, who died on April 1st, just a few months shy of her 103rd birthday. She was laid to rest in Temple, Texas yesterday. Her obituary was carried by the Temple Daily Telegram and can also be accessed on her funeral home's website (along with a bunch of pictures of her over the years if you click on "gallery"). As is my tradition, I am also posting it here (especially because I wrote it!):

Dorothy Ella Johnston, of Temple, departed this earth on April 1, 2025.

Dorothy was born in Osage County, Oklahoma on July 22, 1922 and graduated from Bowlegs High School in Bowlegs, Oklahoma in 1940. In 1941, she entered the Sisters of St. Francis in Maryville, Missouri. She graduated from the St. Anthony School of Nursing in Oklahoma City as a Registered Nurse in 1948, Benedictine Heights College in Tulsa, Oklahoma with a Bachelor of Science in 1956, and St. Louis University in St. Louis, Missouri with a Masters of Education in 1962. She spent most of her career as a medical records administrator but also served as principal of Mount Alverno Academy in Maryville, Missouri in the 1960s. Dorothy left the Sisters of St. Francis in 1968.

In 1973 she settled in Temple, where she would spend the rest of her life. She worked in the medical information section of the Olin E. Teague Veterans Administration Hospital until 1984 and then taught in the Medical Records Technology Program at Temple College until 1987. Whether as a nurse, a teacher, an administrator, or an aunt, and in hospitals, schools, convents and so many other places, Dorothy touched an uncountable number of lives during her 102 years on this planet.

Dorothy will be remembered for her independence, her wisdom, and her enthusiasm for imparting it upon others (whether they wanted it or not!). Dorothy did not realize she was a dog person until later in life, when she met her two best friends, Penny and Daisy.

She is preceded in death by her parents, Henry William Johnston and Ruth Ella Mitchem Johnston, and her brothers James Orrin Johnston and Glen Edwin Johnston. She is survived by her brother Joseph Henry Johnston of Austin, sister Rosemary Teresa Johnston Gray of Houston, sister-in-law Carolyn Johnston of Beaverton, Oregon, and innumerable cousins, nieces, and nephews living all over the world. She also leaves behind many friends and neighbors who provided her support, comfort and companionship.

A mass funeral will be held at 11 am on Monday, April 14, 2025 at St. Luke’s Catholic Church, where she was a parishioner for over half a century. A rosary will precede the service at 10:30, and her ashes will be interred in St. Luke’s columbarium afterwards. In lieu of flowers, her family requests donations be made to Feed My Sheep (116 W Avenue G, Temple, TX 76504).

And now, time for some pictures... 

Dorothy and a very young me, March 1974

Dorothy, along with my grandmother, moved to Temple the same year I was born. Given that Temple is only about three hours away from Houston, I saw her on a regular basis. Most holidays and even some vacations were spent with her and she was always there for the big events of my life, such as graduations and my first wedding. It felt weird being in Temple for her funeral yesterday, knowing that it might have been the last time I would ever be there. 

Dorothy and me in Tucson, Arizona, where we were attending my cousin's wedding, June 2004

Dorothy, having no spouse or children of her own, definitely lived an independent life. I will never forget how she, in her mid-60s, decided to travel down to Ecuador by herself to visit us (and take an excursion into the Amazonian rainforest with us!) when we were spending the summer there. 

The five of us in a hotel in the Ecuadorian rainforest, July 1988

After my grandmother passed away in 2000, Dorothy lived alone. When my uncle and her younger brother Glen, who also lived in Temple, died back in 2007, I wrote that Dorothy's "days of living independently are probably numbered." She proved me wrong by herself for another fifteen years, only having to move out of her house a few months short of her 100th birthday when her eyesight had deteriorated to the point where she could no longer get around her own home. She spent the next two-and-a-half years in assisted living and was only transferred to full nursing care a couple of months ago, when her body finally gave out. Her mental abilities never diminished.

Family, friends and neighbors gathered for Dorothy's 95th birthday, July 2017

This does not mean that Dorothy lived in isolation. She had a number of friends and neighbors who checked on her on a regular basis when she lived in her house, providing her with much-needed support and conversation. Those same people continued to visit her in assisted living. She also had the companionship of Daisy, her dog. Sometimes I'd even make the trip to check in on her.  

Corinne and myself visiting Dorothy and Daisy, June 2021

As for "her wisdom, and her enthusiasm for imparting it upon others (whether they wanted it or not!)," that's a gentle way of saying that Dorothy had very strong opinions and didn't hesitate to share them with others. Sometimes it was humorous, but at other times it could be awkward. She especially loved to nag my brother and me, imploring us to be more obedient to our parents or do better in school. I know it was because she had our best interests in mind, but when we were teenagers it got to the point that we started referring to the street in Temple on which she lived, Lancelot Lane, as "Nag-a-lot Street."

Dorothy spent a lot of time in the kitchen, but her tastes were fairly basic.

Dorothy Johnston led a long and remarkable life, so much of it spent in service of others. She will definitely be missed. After being on this earth for almost 103 years, it will definitely feel strange for Dorothy not to be here anymore.

Dorothy and me shortly after her transfer to a nursing facility, January 2025. This is the last picture of us together.

The San Luis Pass Bridge

I've caught some very nice fish underneath this bridge. It's good to know I won't need to scrounge up spare change to go over it anymore.

The days of fishing in the console for stray quarters when crossing the San Luis Pass bridge are numbered. Galveston County commissioners voted Monday to phase out the required $2 toll over the bridge, the Galveston County Daily News reported.

The motion passed 5-0 after Commissioner Joe Giusti, who put it on the agenda, reportedly said the toll's purpose of paying for the bridge had been fulfilled years ago. He added that the county could absorb the roughly $500,000 collected yearly from the tolls, more than half of which goes toward staffing the booth.

I always knew that the bridge's construction cost had long been paid off; I somehow assumed that tolls were being collected for the bridge's ongoing maintenance. I had no idea that the majority of those proceeds went to the collection staff itself. That doesn't sound like a particularly efficient use of those revenues, but the cash-only bridge was never a model of efficiency. In fact, it was a bit of a pain.

Notwithstanding the Bolivar ferry—of little use when heading back to Houston or Austin—the San Luis Pass bridge is the only land route off the island besides the I-45 causeway. Linking Galveston Island and Brazoria County, it draws extra attention from time to time when construction around the causeway causes horrific backups, like the one in February that had fuming drivers reportedly waiting up to five hours to get back on the mainland.

It probably should be pointed out that this bridge connects Galveston Island to another island - Follett's Island - and it's still another fifteen miles from this bridge to the State Highway 332 bridge in Surfside that connects Follett's Island to the Brazoria County mainland. This is something to keep in mind when using this bridge for, say, hurricane evacuations. 

Built in the 1960s after Hurricane Carla destroyed the previous one, the bridge may not be long for this world either way, according to the Daily News. In 2023, the Texas Department of Transportation rated it in poor condition, noting its deteriorating beams and cracked concrete.

The county is in the embryonic stages of raising the money necessary for a new bridge. Commissioners in February authorized Galveston County Judge Mark Henry to apply for federal grants that would cover most of the cost, the Daily News reported.

Sounds good to me, as long as the new bridge isn't tolled, and I can still catch nice reds and sheepshead underneath it.

Cougars fall short of national title

I was hoping that, in terms of making it to the national championship game, the third time would be a charm for the Houston Cougars and they would claim their first national title. Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be.

Nearly an hour after Houston coach Kelvin Sampson walked off the court amid flurries of Florida-colored orange and blue confetti, he stood in front of a black curtain in a hallway at the Alamodome.

Sampson, 69, faced a phalanx of television lights that illuminated him at his most crushing professional low. The lights shined on his close-cropped hair, which is more salt than pepper, as midnight quickly approached.

With his arms folded across his chest and an NCAA National Final pin adjacent to the UH logo on his gray polo, Sampson distilled the disappointment of Houston squandering a 12-point lead in the second half and ending the national title game with four consecutive turnovers in a 65-63 loss to Florida.

"There's a lot of teams that are not built for six straight wins," Sampson said, referring to the number needed to win the NCAA tournament. "This team was, this team was built, this team had the character and the toughness and the leadership. This team was built to win this tournament, and that's why it's so disappointing. We got here and had a chance and just didn't get it done."

The Cougars led for most of the game but faded down the stretch and lost in a manner eerily reminiscent of their stunning upset at the hands of North Carolina State in the 1983 national championship game. Houston's last shot attempt of the game occurred with 1:25 left up 63-62, and they turned it over four times on their last four possessions, including the ill-fated final possession:

After Florida's Denzel Aberdeen made one of two free throws, Houston had the ball down two with 19 seconds left. Florida's defense stymied Houston's early offensive action, then [UH guard Emanuel] Sharp caught the ball nearly 6 feet behind the 3-point line with five seconds remaining.

Sharp went straight up to attempt a long 3-pointer, but what would have been a 28-footer never got off. Walter Clayton Jr. sniffed out his desperation and lunged at him midair with an outstretched left hand, and it put Sharp in the unenviable position of getting his shot blocked or letting the ball drop.

Sharp shielded Clayton as the ball hit the floor, and Florida's Alex Condon made the hustle play to seal the game by snagging his fourth steal of the night. Sharp slumped down a few feet from his final turnover, his elbows perched atop his knees and fists covering his face as he looked toward the floor.

To be fair to Emanuel, the game should not have come down to him. The Cougars missed easy shots all evening, hitting less than 35% of their field goals and going a lousy 6-25 from beyond the three-point line. They also missed 5 out of 14 free throws. The officiating didn't help either, with the referees missing a obvious Florida goaltending late in the first half and piling up ticky-tack fouls on the Coogs in the second half. But that's no excuse. The Cougars were up by 12 at one point in the second half. They should have won. 

They didn't.

I have to keep my perspective. The fact that the Cougars made the championship game at all is amazing, given their miraculous comeback win over Duke in the semifinal. There are hundreds of college basketball programs out there who would love to be able to claim seven final four appearances and three national championship game appearances, like Houston can. I also need to appreciate the fact that the University of Houston basketball program is nationally prominent today, after spending three decades after the Phi Slama Jama era in utter irrelevance. This game was by no means the end of the road for the Cougars under Kelvin Sampson.

But that doesn't make this loss feel any better. "Best men's basketball program to never have won a championship" isn't a particularly comforting title. This is going to sting for awhile. Assistant coach Kellen Sampson said it best:

"It's a brutal, cruel guillotine," he said, "and when you get here, every team is so good and you don't get here without a team that's connected, resilient, tough. The margins are so razor-thin. We certainly did enough tonight to win. Florida did, as well, and they won."

Let's just hope it's not another 42 years before the Houston Cougars get another bite at the national championship apple.

How far we've come

I've known Greg Propes for for at least 25 years, so it's very cool to see him get a few minutes of fame from the Chronicle based on a picture he took back in December 2013:

Greg Propes, via the Houston Chronicle

Greg Propes arrived inside Hofheinz Pavilion just as the starting lineups were being announced for a non-conference game against Alcorn State in 2013.

“My jaw dropped,” Propes said. “Even by the poor standards that had been set at UH, my jaw dropped when I saw literally nobody there. It blew my mind.”

Propes took photos of Hofheinz from different angles, each showing completely empty sections of red seats for an early December game in coach James Dickey’s final season.

Once again, the photos surfaced on social media this week, showing just how far the University of Houston men’s basketball program has come since the arrival of coach Kelvin Sampson a year later.

That night, Propes posted the photos on the fan website CoogFans.com. He counted 43 fans sitting in the section behind the scorer’s table. He counted 15 students. The announced attendance for UH’s 31-point win was 2,833.

“I’m embarrassed to be here. I’m embarrassed for the players. I’m embarrassed,” Propes wrote on the website’s message board.

UH message boards were referring to Hofheinz as "the Tomb" at the time, because people simply weren't going to the games. It didn't matter that the game Greg attended was on a Monday night during finals week against an uninteresting opponent; the Coogs could have been playing North Carolina on Saturday and the crowd probably wouldn't have been much larger. The program was simply not relevant nationally nor of interest to local sports fans, UH alums included. About six weeks after Greg took this picture, I wrote:

I freely admit that I'm part of the problem; I rarely attend UH basketball games these days because, well, the games just aren't much fun for me anymore. Sure, I should be a good alumnus and support my school's hoops program through thick and thin. But when the team plays one of the weakest non-conference schedules in the nation but still only manages an 8-5 record, when the program has made exactly one NCAA Tournament appearance in the last twenty-two years, when the head coach is an aging retread who was coaching middle school girl's basketball when he was hired, when attending Cougar basketball games feels less like entertainment and more like a chore... Well, I guess I've just reached "that point of apathy" that [former Houston Press writer John] Royal writes about. There was a time when I really cared about UH basketball. Now I couldn't even tell you when the next home game is.

After the 2013-14 season was over, the University of Houston fired James Dickey (who never should have been hired to begin with), and tapped Kelvin Sampson to lead the program out of the abyss.  

Today, things are completely different. The Coogs play in front of packed crowds at the renovated Fertitta Center. The program won the Big XII conference for the second year in a row. The team is heading to their seventh Final Four in program history this weekend. UH basketball is no longer merely relevant; it is one of the nation's best. 

It's amazing to see just how much things have changed in a dozen years.

“Kelvin Sampson is a miracle worker,” Propes said. “What has happened to UH — and I don’t use the word lightly — is a miracle what happened here.”

Monarch population rebounds

This story is a month old at this point, but these days I'll share any good news I can get:

In encouraging news, the eastern monarch butterfly population nearly doubled in 2025, according to a new report announced in Mexico. The population wintering in central Mexico's forests occupied 4.42 acres, up from 2.22 acres during the previous winter. While monarchs occupied nearly twice as much forest habitat as last year, populations remain far below the long-term average.

The survey, Forest Area Occupied by Monarch Butterflies Colonies in Mexico During the 2024-2025 Hibernation Season is conducted annually by WWF-Mexico and Mexico's National Commission of Protected Natural Areas in collaboration with local communities, and it serves as an important indicator of the butterfly's overall population health. 

“We recognize the key role of local communities, as well as the support of the government of Mexico in conserving the forest and providing this iconic species with the opportunity to thrive,” said Jorge Rickards, director general of WWF Mexico. "It’s now time to turn this year’s increase into a lasting trend with an all-hands approach where governments, landowners, conservationists, and citizens continue to safeguard critical habitats along the monarch’s North American migratory route.”

Scientists attribute much of this year’s population growth to better weather conditions in 2024—with less severe drought than in previous years—along the butterflies' migration route from the United States and Canada to Mexico.

Improvements have also been made in protecting the overwintering forests in Mexico from threats such as illegal logging. Here's this year's graph from monarchwatch.org:

monarchwatch.org

One season does not a trend make, and as the graph above shows, the migrating monarch butterfly population is tis just a fraction of what it's historically been. But given last year's particularly grim report, this is good. Monarchs are resilient - how many other species can double their population in the span of a single year? - but they still need our help:

Monarchs still face several threats. For example, climatic variations in the monarch’s breeding areas in Canada and the United States can impact the abundance of milkweed, the only plant in which the butterflies lay their eggs, and from which monarch caterpillars feed. Land-use changes in the United States, combined with the widespread use of herbicides and insecticides, have also contributed to the loss of milkweed and other nectar plants adult monarchs need to feed from. And while high levels of illegal logging in the monarch butterfly reserve have been halted, forest degradation in the overwintering sites in Mexico could be a threat if left unchecked.

Remember, folks: 80% of our agricultural production depends on pollinating insects such as monarchs, and other pollinators are having population crises of their own. Protecting the monarch isn't just good for them; it's good for us.

So plant that milkweed.