Journal columnist John Edward ‘Jack’ Johnson has died.
The long-time Dandenong resident passed away on Saturday 25 June and will be farewelled in the Reflection Chapel at Springvale Botanical Cemetery at 11.45am on Thursday 30 June.
Jack’s parents rented a house in McCrae Street, Dandenong, and he attended St Mary’s Primary School with his brothers and sister.
Jack later raised five children with wife Frances in a home he built in Macpherson Street.
He’d left his beloved home town to live with his son in Sherbrook until late last year, when he happily told the Journal he’d moved back to Dandenong, taking up a place at Southern Cross Care at 82 McCrae Street.
Jack said his bedroom was roughly where his old St Mary’s Primary School stood.
Since October 2014 the Journal has published a weekly column from Jack’s book When The Clock Strikes, his account of growing up in Dandenong, tending to the city’s pipes and drains as a plumber, and bringing up his family.
The column will continue to appear each month.