Practically Impractical: The Story of Barbara Johnson and the Lives She Touched

By Maeghan Kimball and Michelle Benczkowski

This book is a collection of memories of the Late Barbara Johnson by her students and family for the purpose of remembering and sharing the lessons, on the farm and off the farm, that she taught.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jul 31, 2020
• ISBN: 9781716689215

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Impractical

The Story of Barbara Johnson and the Lives She Touched

A person riding a horse in a field Description automatically generated

Copyright © 2020 by Maeghan Jo Kimball & Michelle Benczkowski

Cover Photo Credit Judith M. Bosco

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal.

First Printing: 2020

ISBN 978-1-71668-921-5

Flaming Accordions

Sterling, VA

www.flamingaccordions.com

[e-mail]

Many thanks to all of the people who shared their precious memories of Barbara Johnson with me. Words cannot express the depth of my gratitude. Special thanks to my fellow denizen of the windy room, Jolene Laughlin, for the title, and to Donald Johnson, Patty Stovel and Lexie Cerys Stovel for their patience and insight in doing justice to this project. I am also forever grateful to my chosen sister Maeghan Kimball for helping me get my act together and organize my thoughts. I could have never done this without you. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart. ~ Michelle Benczkowski

The heavens have gained a beautiful star.

Barbara Johnson was lots of things to so many people. Mother, wife, mentor, teacher, critic, cheerleader, friend, taskmaster, inspiration. She was all that and so much more.

There are many horse people, both professionals and amateurs across all the major equestrian sports that can trace their success back to her. We are successful because she led us to the most important part of horsemanship; how to speak and understand horse. She taught us the right combination of firmness and empathy. She taught us to listen to what the horse wanted to do in life and to work with the horse’s strengths as opposed to against its weaknesses. Her preference was always teaching the little ones. She was never happier than when she was teaching a little nugget to groom a pony or trot around the ring. While she was happiest at home with the littles, she had a huge impact on the national scene both through her children, Patty Stovel and Robert Johnson, and by her own right. One interesting thing that many probably don’t know is that Barbara was responsible for AHSA adopting the short stirrup division. She realized that the littlest riders would be better off jumping in a safer environment than on the big open hunt fields of her day, so she made it happen.

She taught us to work hard by example. She never cut us or herself any breaks when it came to the animals. They always came first. I don’t think any of us could ever keep up with her. We never worked for her. We worked alongside, well twenty steps behind, her. She never asked us to do anything she wouldn’t do or wasn’t doing. The exceptions were using tools and painting. It was much easier to fetch a hammer and wander past her husband Arthur with it. He would take it away, grumble a bit, and go fix whatever needed fixing. As to painting, it was much safer to keep her away from the paintbrush, otherwise everything but what she wanted painted ended up with paint on it. This always included herself and any of the permanent itinerant horses wandering around the farm, especially a little bay Quarter Horse named Jack who loved to help and become an Appaloosa in the process.

Mrs. J, as so many of us will always think of her, was a collector of strays: raccoons, cats, dogs, horses, goats, and people. It really didn’t matter. She always had one of us working for her or living in her house. She loved all of us and was fascinated by what makes us tick. She gave her strays a sense of love and stability while building strength and self-esteem by pushing us well past our self-imposed limitations. If she said we could do something, we could. Her son, Donald Johnson, carries on her unique appreciation and understanding of human nature as a world-renowned psychologist.

Mrs. J was a taskmaster. She expected you to give your best. Every time. All the time. She didn’t much care if you were tired, cold, hungry, or scared. She expected you to pick yourself up, dust yourself off and get back on. She was hard to please, but when she smiled (which was often) or told you that she was proud of you (which wasn’t often) you felt like you were on top of the world. If she rewarded you with a special trail ride for just the two of you, you won the lottery. She would look back at you with a twinkle in her eye and the next thing you knew you were galloping at breakneck speed across a field trying to catch her. Her laugh was the most like the most beautiful music.

Some of my fondest memories involved muffins or brownies at 2am or working the crossword puzzles all day at the kitchen table with her voice getting louder as she got excited and Mr. J in the living room turning the TV up louder and louder so he could listen to the Giants game. It was kind of a game for her. She would get that twinkle in her eye and crank up her volume. The TV never had a chance.

Barbara was the best friend you could have. She told the best stories about people that she had known, things she had seen and done, her kids, crazy horses, cats, dogs, racoons, squirrels, and goats. Listening to her while cleaning tack in the winter in the living room was amazing. Life didn’t get any better than that. Getting lost with her was always an experience. You always ended up where you needed to be, eventually, but often by the most roundabout way possible. Her huge laugh, her warmth and her quirky sense of humor will stay with us for the rest of our days. She may be gone but she will live on in all of us. Rest in peace my dear friend.

- Michelle Benczkowski (Mogulnicki)

The Story of Barbara Johnson

There are some people who live good lives, do their jobs, raise their families, retire, and depart this world with a whisper. Their family and friends miss them when they are gone, but they leave no real mark on the world. There are others who are larger than life, that leave a huge mark on the world by just being themselves. Their influence spans generations and makes us all better for it. Barbara Johnson was such a person. She did not set out to change the world, but she influenced so many lives in such a positive fashion that the ripples will endure for generations.

Barbara Johnson, or Mrs. J as she is fondly known by many of us, entered the world on August 23, 1931 as Barbara Lou Blatchley in Killingworth, Connecticut. Barbara was a special child with a huge heart. Her empathy extended to all creatures great and small. From a humble start collecting scrap metal with her pony cart for the World War II war effort, to watering the neighbor’s draft horses because they had none, to reuniting a crochety old neighbor with his beloved dog, she displayed a kindness and desire to care for all living things. Her love of teaching came early. She attended the last one room schoolhouse in Connecticut where she greatly enjoyed helping teach the younger children and making sure that they were all dressed and warm in the cold Connecticut winters.

In 1951 she married her beloved Buster, Arthur W. Johnson. They were an amazing team for over 55 years, until his passing in 2007. She took care of the horses and taught the children while Buster took care of building and repairing their farms, transporting the horses, and announcing at the horse shows. They had an endearing camaraderie that involved lots of teasing and laughter.

Barbara and Arthur had 3 children. The eldest, Donald is the only one who did not follow his mother into the horse world. Instead, Donald used the intelligence, empathy, and passion for teaching inherited from his mother to become a well-known psychologist. He teaches at Assumption University in Huamuk, Thailand where he lives with his wife Aon. Donald has two daughters, Becky and Molly. Becky spent many a summer running feral with her grandmother at

Woodstock Acres.

Robert, their younger son, came along in 1956. His involvement in the horse industry gravitated towards Quarter Horses and the western sports. Robert was the 2002 World Champion in Reining and a five-time American Quarter Horse Congress champion in Trail and Reining. Barbara and Arthur turned over Quarry Town Stables to him and his ex-wife Carolyn in 1989 when they moved to Woodstock. Many of Robert and Carolyn’s riders competed very successfully at the state and national championships in the American Quarter Horse Association. In 2014 he moved operations with his mom to Johnson Performance Horses in Miller, Missouri. Robert