Wilbur "Bill" Richard Johnson was born in Schurz on August 13, 1931, to Robert and Deborah Brown Johnson. His Grandmother, Mary Sherwin Brown, acted as the midwife, because this was a year before the Schurz hospital opened. He was the third eldest of six sons. During his elementary years, he attended the public school at Schurz.

After graduating from elementary school, Wilbur attended Churchill County High, in the late 1940s, with his older brothers, Robert and Carl. Wilbur's favorite high school sport was basketball.

After graduating from High School, Wilbur enlisted in the Air Force. He was trained as a right gunner in a B-29. During his training, his shooting skills manifested themselves. As part of his training they were given in flight shooting practice. His turret was on the bottom of the plane but his sights were in the bubble he sat in on the side of the plane. To make the shooting practice more challenging guns were moved so the sights in his bubble were different than where his guns were shooting. Every sixth shot or so out of the gun turrets had a tracer which showed the gunner where his trajectories were going. By examining these tracers, Wilbur could estimate how far off the sights were. With this strategy, he was hitting nearly every radio controlled drone that was sent his direction. As a result, his commanding officer asked him to quite hitting so many of the drones because they were very expensive. He flew numerous bombing flights during the Korean War and he had a number of harrowing experiences. On one mission, the bombs got hung up in the bomb bay. Since the right gunner position was the closest position to the bomb bay, Wilbur climbed into the bomb bay and kicked the bottom bombs loose to get the bay to release all the other bombs. Since there were over a hundred bombers on that mission, had he not released the bombs in the bay, they would have had to circle around and come back into pattern after the last bomber on that mission. Wilbur later estimated that it would have taken nearly two hours to make a second run.

Upon discharge, Bill returned home and had a number of different jobs. He drove the Yerington high school bus for a short time, and worked as a powder monkey at Anaconda. He wanted a position with the Nevada Fish and Wildlife but also applied with Bell of Nevada. Bell of Nevada was the first to hire him. Wilbur started at the bottom of the company as a lineman. Eventually, he was stationed in the Lovelock phone station. His job at the time was to maintain microwave sites in the area. While there, he married Dorothy Bobb. They had one daughter, Janet.

The time came when Wilbur realized that he had to go to college. He first attended Modesto Junior College. After graduating, he attended San Jose State University where he graduated with a degree in Electrical Engineering. While at San Jose State he purchased a BSA motorcycle. While riding it on campus, he caught the eye of a tall attractive woman, Kathy Bluhm and they were married in 1961. They lived in Reno and had two sons, Henry and Jim. Wilbur returned to working with Nevada Bell and was promoted to engineer. As an engineer, his responsibility was to predict growth patterns of a city and then design equipment to meet that growth. He conducted surveys and visited developers to determine where growth and development was likely to occur in the future.

In about 1978 Wilbur applied for a job with a communication contractor that was working in Iran. Wilbur enjoyed this job. His Iranian coworkers identified with him because Wilbur was a very social person and they were of the same complexion. Wilbur also went out of his way to learn the Persian language. While enroute to a microwave site, Wilbur stopped at a Persian tailor and ordered a suit. Things were heating up in the streets of Tehran and employees of the American contractor were talking about what they would do if fighting in the streets broke out. Wilbur said he was going to put on his Persian suit, go up to the roof top, go across the roof of several buildings and then down to the street. He would join the crowd and throw rocks at the building. However, his Iranian coworker said he was to go with them and they would hide him. After the Shah was overthrown in 1979, Wilbur's employer called him and told him to be at the airport at a specific time and he would be flown out of the country. If he wasn't at the airport at that time, his employer could not guarantee that they would be able to get him out of that Iran.
When Wilbur returned from Iran, he took a job with Pacific Bell. He was considered the power expert for the company. When the company had a failure of equipment and no one could diagnose the problem, they would assign a helper to Bill and give him a schematic of the equipment. He stayed on these projects until he found the problems. Many of times it was 2:00, 3:00 or 4:00 the next morning.
Wilbur's favorite past times included: gardening, fishing, attending boat shows, buying boat parts, and rebuilding boats, and raising bees.

Wilbur's third wife was his fishing companion Lou. Their favorite fishing trip was to boat up the Sacramento Delta, drop anchor and spend the night. Lou liked to barbecue a fresh catch of fish on the boat.

In 2011, Wilbur married his friend and fourth wife Zenaida "Zeny" Smith. They enjoyed taking day trips together, to inspect real estate or anything else that was interesting. Zeny has two children from a previous marriage, Maria (Marc) Bautista and Reed (Jimin) Smith.

Funeral services will be held at 1:00 pm on Saturday, February 18 at the Schurz gym, viewing will be at the gym from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm. Burial will be at the Schurz cemetery immediately following the funeral.

Wilbur is survived by a brother, Wayne Johnson, and three first cousins. He was preceded in death by his parents and four brothers. He leaves two sons, Henry and Jim, and one daughter, Janet. He also leaves two step children, Maria Bautista and Reed Smith. In total, Wilbur leaves 10 grandchildren.

While at the Veterans Memorial hospital in Reno, Wilbur Richard Johnson continued his journey to the next world on Wednesday, February 8, 2016, at 3:15 am.

Family and friends are invited to sign his online guest book at www.FRFH.net. Arrangements are under the direction of Freitas Rupracht Funeral Home, 25 Hwy 208 Yerington, NV 89447 (775) 463-2911