Elizabeth L. Johnson

Elizabeth L. Johnson led music teaching in the Billerica public schools for more than thirty years. A graduate of the Lowell Teachers College, from which she held a B.S.E. degree, she was appointed in 1951, the year the School Department accepted the resignation of the previous music supervisor, Pauline Young. The Superintendent's report for that year noted that the music curriculum had just been broadened "to include instrumental experience on all levels." In her early years she taught music at Howe High School as well as in the elementary grades, and she played the piano accompaniment at Howe High School graduation exercises in the early 1950s.

As elementary music supervisor she led the growth of Billerica's instrumental music program. In the fall of 1954 the schools began, "under the initiative and supervision of our elementary music supervisor, Mrs. Johnson," band and orchestra instruction for pupils in grades four through eight, at no additional cost to the school department, taught by student teachers from the Lowell State Teachers College. The partnership with the college grew into a lasting arrangement: through the 1960s Lowell music students did their practice and intern teaching in Billerica's schools under her direction and that of Dr. William R. Fisher, and in 1966 the town's system was "selected to provide demonstration and actual classroom experience" for all of the college's junior and senior music students.

Her annual reports, signed first as Music Supervisor and later as Music Coordinator, trace that growth. In 1961 she reported that the music program had been "completely reorganized" into a coordinated course from the elementary grades through high school, that the instrumental program "continues to grow by leaps and bounds," and that a high school orchestra had been started. Enrollment in instrumental classes rose from 250 pupils in 1962 to more than 400 elementary pupils alone by 1966. Her department also ran an experimental seventh-grade humanities course that was used for demonstrations to state supervisors of art and music, and by 1967 her department had grown to nine members, with a high school band in new uniforms, choruses at the junior and senior high schools, and pupils chosen for the All-State Band. The 1960 Warrior yearbook, which pictures her among the high school faculty, credits her with the high school band and chorus, and the elementary schools staged operettas such as "Cowboy on the Moon" (1962) with her help.

Her music was part of town life as well. She accompanied the National Anthem at the piano at the annual Town Meeting of March 1966, and in 1974 she was preparing a Bicentennial Concert for the town, with children from every school joining the high school chorus and orchestra in music "from the American Revolution Days to the days of 1976." In 1978 the University of Lowell presented her with a plaque for outstanding service to public education, and at the 1980 Town Meeting she was publicly recognized as the person "in charge of all music in the Billerica School." The town's memorial also credits her with service as a Town Meeting member from 1965 to 1971; the precinct lists of those years print that Precinct Five member's name as Elizabeth A. Johnson.

She retired in 1985, and at that year's Town Meeting the Superintendent of Schools spoke of the changes in the music department upon her retirement, with Paul Cox succeeding her as music coordinator. Elizabeth L. Johnson died on June 25, 1995, and the town's 1995 report lists her among those it remembered, for service in the "Billerica School Music Department: 1953-1985."

References

1. In Memoriam, 1995 Town Report (died June 25, 1995; music department 1953-1985; Town Meeting 1965-1971)
2. Superintendents report, 1951 (appointed; Pauline Young resigned)
3. School teacher list, 1953 (Music; Lowell, B.S.E.; appointed 1951)
4. Town report, 1955 (new instrumental music program under Mrs. Johnson)
5. Report of the Music Department, 1961 (signed as Music Supervisor)
6. Report of the Music Department, 1967 (signed as Music Coordinator)
7. Annual Town Meeting, March 12, 1966 (accompanied the National Anthem at the piano)
8. Superintendents report, 1978 (honored by the University of Lowell)
9. Annual Town Meeting, 1985 (her retirement as music coordinator)
10. Warrior yearbook, 1960 (faculty portrait: Lowell Teachers College, Music)