Evelyn Porterfield Johnson (1937-2021)

Evelyn Porterfield Johnson was born in Kansas City, Missouri on January 7, 1937, and moved to the Washington area as a child. She graduated from Eastern Baptist College now Eastern University near Philadelphia and attended Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina.

In 1968, she moved to historic Clayton Hall, a stone house in Bluemont built in 1797 that had been sitting empty for about 15 years. In 1969, she became the Bluemont correspondent and began writing the weekly column called Bluemont Countryside for the Loudoun Times-Mirror and later for The Clarke Courier.

She was an active member of the Loudoun County community; co-authored a book, “From Snickersville to Bluemont, The Biography and History of a Virginia Village“; wrote numerous columns and articles for local newspapers and magazines; was active in local politics; helped found the Preservation Society of Loudoun county; and taught English and Journalism at Loudoun County High School in Leesburg for 17 years.

She is survived by her four daughters, Jennifer Morrison of Front Royal, VA, Lara Johnson of Rutherford, NJ, Tracey Bishop of Middletown, VA and Virginia Johnson of Bluemont, VA. She is also survived by her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Excerpt from a book published in 2017 entitled “A Decade of Bluemont News”, a collection of her Bluemont News columns covering the years 1969-1979, which originally appeared in the Loudoun Times-Mirror newspaper.

The below is an essay written by Evelyn Porterfield Johnson for the book: “Rockin with Porch Memories”, Editor: L. Claire Kincannon and Associate Editors: Linda Ankrum and Marty Potts, copyright, 2005.

The Porch at Clayton Hall, by Evelyn Porterfield Johnson

I like to tell my children, “You had an idyllic childhood”. Not only did I have the privilege of living it with them, I wrote about it weekly for seventeen years as the Bluemont correspondent for the Loudoun Times-Mirror and The Clarke Courier. And a lot of their growing up in our little village of Bluemont was played out on our big front porch. The concrete floor porch had been added to the 1797 stone house in the late ’30’s. It has a tin roof, flat though it has never caved in from a snow accumulation. Four columns frame the facade and originally it had a formal wooden ceiling which had developed a leak. One workman wanted to tear the roof off to correct the problem. Many times since, I have counted my blessings I said “No!” We just tore out the ceiling and now with the exposed beams, it works beautifully, thank you.

In essence the front porch is our extended living space from Memorial Day to after the Bluemont Fair, the third weekend of September. The number of birthday candles lit on cakes on the picnic table could never be calculated. As part of the early celebrations of the birthdays, the daughters would put on plays with entrances and exits from the hall onto the porch. A young neighbor came on one occasion, accompanied by his two pet goats, who gleefully mounted the ledges of the wide steps, the children screaming in excitement.

Dinner parties for adult friends have graced the big sturdy picnic table, made by a foster child in his vo-tech classes through Valley High School.

There have been parties for political candidates and a fond remembered steak dinner shared as raindrops fell on the tin roof.

The wicker and the hanging swing, bought from Nichols Hardware, go out in May. Red geraniums always decorate the ledges in window boxes.

In previous summer evenings, the children frolicked, catching lightning bugs on the lawn or sometimes helped churn ice cream for the Fourth of July celebration at the old school grounds in the village.

In fall we put out the pumpkins and stack the wood for the approaching cold, take down the swing and put out the old red school bench.

In winter, the sled and snow shovels go out. The prettiest sight I ever saw on the porch was a bough of freshly-cut holly dusted with snow, an early surprise Christmas gift from a neighbor. I have my bird house collection out on a tin-top table and there among some of my favorite things and blooming plants, I like to sit on the porch. Feeling the cool breezes from the swing in the summer, I recall special times with family and friends. But oh, how I wish, I could once utter to a passersby as in the days of another generation, “Won’t you come up and sit a spell? I have the porch for it!”

Evelyn died on August 4, 2021.