Former Henderson mayor and local businessman Glenn Johnson is remembered as a hard worker who came from difficult circumstances to achieve success.
Johnson died on Jan. 15, and his obituary appeared in the Hendersonian’s Feb. 2 e-newsletter. He was 88.
Johnson’s wife the past 25 years, Pem Pfisterer Clark, said during his 42 years at the helm of Matt’s News and Gifts, the shop was open 365 days a year from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.
“He really never did close,” she said, adding Johnson averaged 60-70 hours of work each week.
Johnson came from tough circumstances, Pfisterer Clark said. His mother died of a brain tumor when he was five, and his father traveled for work, which caused Johnson to spend a great deal of his childhood in boardinghouses and under the care of the women who ran them.
As a boy, Johnson started working for Matt Brown, owner of Matt’s News Stand. His first role was newspaper delivery and his route was the 41-Strip, where at the time many taverns were located. Pfisterer Clark said Johnson found out that delivering tips later in the day—which allowed for more libation intake—was a good business strategy.
“The later he waited to deliver papers, the bigger tip he got,” she said.
In high school, Johnson worked at the store, sweeping floors, filling the soda machines and stocking shelves. At this time, he became interested in bodybuilding, said Pfisterer Clark, and won the Mr. Junior Kentucky title. Another interest was the circus, and Johnson trained in juggling and slack wire walking and even traveled to Florida to a Ringling Brothers training facility, but ultimately decided he didn’t want to live the nomad life and returned home, Pfisterer Clark said.
He later joined the Army, served two years in Korea, and came back to Henderson in 1959, when Brown offered to sell Matt’s to him.
In 2005, Matt’s was named the Henderson Chamber of Commerce’s small business of the year, according to Johnson’s obituary. Johnson also served for 37 years as a member of the Salvation Army’s advisory board and a Henderson County Fiscal Court magistrate. He also served as Henderson’s mayor from 1994-1999.
Johnson’s 5-year term came after a state law to remove elections from one of year in the election cycle, which required some officials to serve an extra year before the next election, said Bill “Stevens” Starks, who covered Johnson’s mayoral term when he was the news director at WSON.
Starks said the biggest issue during Johnson’s term was the mayor’s push to get rid of the downtown parking meters. Starks said the move came at a time when shopping malls were dominating the retail scene, and as a downtown businessman, Johnson wants to put more focus back on the area.
Starks said there may have been some initial concern, “but it really did help.” And of course, there’s never been an outcry to bring them back, Starks said.
He also mentioned the city commission at the time making a priority to upgrade parks.
As he was serving as mayor, Johnson still ran his business and most of the time he was there, Starks said. If someone had a beef, they could go to the store on Elm Street and find him there. He was “very accessible,” Starks said.
Matt’s, and Johnson, also regularly served as an intermediary to sell tickets for fundraisers, school events, civic events and whatever other organizations needed help selling.
“Everyone always went to Glenn at Matt’s to kind of be there go-between to sell the tickets,” Starks said.
“He obviously loved the community,” Starks said.
At 65, Johnson retired, sold the store and started to go to work with his wife. Pfisterer Clark hosts a nationally syndicated radio show, Wedding Planning with Pem. He also began taking piano lessons from longtime teacher Grace Swingle—“And loved it, he loved it,” Pfisterer Clark. “Of course, he was the oldest student.”
They had fun with that, pinning lesson money in an envelope to his shirt, with Swingle pinning his lessons on his return home.
Soon after he retired, he was diagnosed with throat cancer. Pfisterer Clark said he lived with the cancer for 22 years, which is “pretty much unheard of.” Remarkably he was always in a good mood, commenting daily about the good day he’d had.
And he was fed through a tube the last 6 ½ years—“I fed him,” Pfisterer Clark.
“He never complained about anything,” she said. “Never.”
Read Johnson’s obituary here.
