RIP Doug Johnson

Another television personality from my childhood has passed away:

Houston native and longtime local weathercaster Doug Johnson died Thursday, as reported by KPRC, where he worked for decades. He was 79. 

Johnson's career at KPRC spanned 33 years, starting in the early-'60s when he began work as a radio announcer and later co-hosting "Scene at 5" with Ron Stone. The two had a natural chemistry together, which translated to loose humor off screen.

Johnson was a Native Houstonian, who was born and grew up in the Heights and attendaed what was then Reagan High School before attending TCU. After a stint in Fairbanks, Alaska, he returned to Houston in 1962. He joined KPRC and co-anchored the “scene at 5” with Ron Stone (who himself passed away a decade ago):

His rapport and friendship with Stone was apparent to anyone who watched the duo. That chemistry is what made the newscast so enjoyable, according to Bruce Bryant, who directed the show.

“It had humor in a place that you wouldn’t normally find humor,” Bryant said.
The personality-driven newscast featured stories that were on the lighter side of news and finished with a chat segment that showcased the pair’s innate ability to connect with people.

“There was no pretense with them,” Bryant said.

In a segment that became the stuff of television lore, Johnson employed a chicken to help him tell the weather, but Wilma the Weather Chicken had her own ideas of what to do on television. Instead of pecking on the rain cloud or sun, Wilma took flight and landed on top of a camera. Johnson was bitten when he went to retrieve the fowl from her roost. 

While there was the lighter side to his job, Johnson guided Houstonians through some of the worst natural disasters the city has ever experienced.

Johnson was on duty when Hurricane Alicia hit in 1983. We closely followed his reporting up to and until the brunt of the storm hit Houston and we lost power. Maybe it was simply because I was a kid at the time, but there was something reassuring about his reporting leading up to the storm: it was as if everything was going to be okay because Doug Johnson was with us. 

Via KPRC, a retrospective of Doug Johnson's career here in Houston, including the aforementioned chicken incident: