with fish. Johnson purchased a log cabin in Maine, numbered all of its parts, and brought it down to, where it was rebuilt on the shore of Lower Pond. The retreat was officially opened on June 12, 1891. In the early 1900s the partners increased the size of the property. Personal life In 1879, Johnson became affiliated with the First Universalist Church of Lynn. He was elected a member of the Parish on March 26, 1883, and received into Church membership on April 8, 1887. He was a superintendent of the Church School from 1886 to 1890, a trustee from 1888 to 1893 and in 1895, and chairman of the Board of Management from 1917 to 1921 and again from 1924 to 1928. On June 15, 1881, Johnson married Ida Oliver of Saugus. They had two children, Romilly and Marian. Romilly, also known as George Romilli was a composer who wrote the score for the Broadway musical Floretta with George Bagby. Ida Johnson died on May 27, 1894, in Lynn of pneumonia. On June 18, 1896, Johnson married Virginia Vernon Newhall. They had three children, Richard, Benjamin Jr., and Virginia, but only their sons lived into adulthood. Virginia Newhall Johnson died on July 5, 1926. Death Johnson died on February 19, 1932, at his home in Lynn after several months of illness. Civic memorial services were held at the First Universalist Church in Lynn on March 20, 1932. In his will, Newhall left $35,000 in public gifts – $5,000 to the Methodist Episcopal Church of East Saugus to be used for the salary of the pastor, $5,000 to the town of Saugus for the purchase of library books, $10,000 to Radcliffe College for the establishment of the Virginia N. Johnson scholarship fund for worthy young women, preferably from Lynn, $5,000 to the First Universalist Church of Lynn, and $10,000 the Lynn Historical Society. In 1934, the executors for Johnson and Clough sold the Breakheart Hill Forest to the Metropolitan District Commission for use as a state park. References 1856 births 1923 deaths American conservationists American Universalists Harvard College alumni Massachusetts lawyers Massachusetts Republicans People from Lynn, Massachusetts People from Saugus, Massachusetts Phillips Exeter Academy alumni Sons of the American Revolution School board members in Massachusetts Boston University School of Law alumni Historians from Massachusetts Chapel Hill – Chauncy Hall School alumni 19th-century American lawyers