Known to many as ‘the Betty Crocker of legislative history,’ Nancy Johnson had a smile under all conditions.
“Everyone loved her for that reason,” said her husband Bill Johnson.
During her 1980-2012 tenure at Georgia State University, Johnson served as head law librarian, associate dean for library and information services and professor of law. Many who knew her said she built the Georgia State Law Library collection from the ground up.
Johnson wrote “Sources of Compiled Legislative Histories” which has been published with regular updates since 1979.
“From the very first Congress she traced every bill and how it became a law,” said her husband. “In the days before there were computers,” he added.
Nancy Patricia Johnson died Dec. 13 of ovarian cancer. She was 65. A memorial service will be held 1:30 p.m. Sunday at the Atlanta Botanical Garden, 1345 Piedmont Avenue N.E., Atlanta.
“She made the challenging responsibility she had, at the law school, of building a library from scratch almost look easy because she was so understated and modest of how she went about doing it,” said Steven Kaminshine, Dean of Law at GSU.
“She was an incredible blend of talent, competence, modesty, and generosity,” he added.
Born in Chicago in 1949, Johnson graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Marycrest College in Davenport, Iowa in 1971, a master’s in library science from the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana in 1974 and a doctorate from Georgia State University College of Law in 1985.
Johnson worked in a variety of libraries, for nearly 50 years.”She got her first job in a library at 14,” said her husband. From Chicago inner-city bookmobiles in the in the ’60s to law schools at the University of Chicago and the University of Illinois in the 70s.
She served as president of the Atlanta Law Libraries Association in 1990-91 and of the Southeastern Chapter of the American Association of Law Libraries in 2003-04. In 2011 Johnson was inducted into the American Association of Law Libraries Hall of Fame.
“She continuously shocked us at what she could accomplish,” said her colleague Terrance Manion.
A lover of yoga, Johnson also stayed up-to-date on popular fiction and technology. She was one of the early founders of Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction’s Legal Research Community Authoring project.
“She gamely fought back her illness for over six years in the same way she lived her life, built our law library and engaged her profession — with unmatched class, modesty, talent and courage,” said Kaminshine.
“You would never guess she was this rock-star in the law librarianship profession,” said Manion, noting her humility. “She was a mentor and an inspiration to an entire generation of law librarians.”
In addition to her husband, Johnson is survived by son Patrick Johnson; sisters Maureen Baude of Watersmeet, Mich., and Kathy Reilly of Chicago, and one grandchild.
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