Mary Etta Johnston, 84 Hills, died Monday, April 27, 2015, at Sanford Hospital in Luverne.
A funeral service was Saturday, May 2, at Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Hills.
Mary Etta Johnston was born Dec. 19, 1930, to Virgil R. and Gladys E. (Collins) Anderson in Eagle Butte, South Dakota. She attended country school and Eagle Butte High School. While in high school she lived with her grandmother. After high school she worked at a café in Eagle Butte.
On April 3, 1949, she married Norman “Dan” Johnston in Dupree, South Dakota. They moved to her parents’ ranch near Eagle Butte. Through the years they lived various places including Alaska, just off the Glenn-Allen Highway, Susanville, and Orangeville, California, where they owned and operated Signal Gas Station. In 1961 they moved to Falls City, Oregon, and lived there until April 1968, when they moved to Olivet, South Dakota. In June 1969 they returned to Falls City. In 1971 they moved to Hills.
Mary Etta was passionate about drawing, painting, leather work, crocheting, knitting and gardening. She especially enjoyed playing music and writing songs and poems.
She is survived by two children, Dan (Tracie) Johnston, Florida, and Jillian Johnston, Sioux Falls, South Dakota; four grandchildren, Tracy Selby, Winchester, California, Dan L. Johnston III, Dallas, Texas, Nicholas Klein, Hills, and Brandee Hanson, Eureka, South Dakota; eight great-grandchildren; five great-great-grandchildren; two brothers, Cal (Sandy) Anderson, Redding, California, and Jack (Debbie) Anderson, Alturas, California; six sisters, Alice (Leon) Beauchamp, Falls City, Katheryn (Larry) Carey, Bend, Oregon, Alexia Baughman, Redmond, Oregon, Virginia Martin, Susanville, California, April Ayla and Eva Ward, both of Dallas, Oregon; and many other relatives and friends.
She was preceded in death by her parents; her husband, Norman Johnston, on July 23, 2003; an infant daughter, Joy Romaine Johnston; three brothers, Charles, Bill and Guy Anderson; a sister, Hope Cult; and a grandson-in-law, Justin Hanson.
Funeral arrangements were by Jurrens Funeral Home of Hills, www.jurrensfuneralhome.com.
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