After 50 years of law, Johnson handing over law office reinsby Nathan Arneal Rodney Johnson remembers the conversation with his dad Harry well. The 1969 North Bend Central graduate had just graduated from Nebraska Wesleyan with a degree in economics. He and his dad were driving around the streets of North Bend contemplating the future.
“So what are you?” Harry asked his son. “I’m an economist,” Rod replied. “So what is that?” “Well, I’m not sure.” “You ever think,” his dad proffered, “about maybe going to Dad made a pretty good point. During his coursework, Rod had taken a business law class that he liked, so maybe law school was something to consider? After that little nudge from his father, Rod Johnson graduated from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln College of Law in 1976 and was admitted to the bar July 2. That will be 50 years next week, and Johnson, 75, is ready to call it a career. He is slowly winding down his practice while his successor gets up to speed. That successor is McKinley Wilson, a native of Yutan, who has been working out of Johnson’s North Bend office since April. So far, so good. “It’s been going really well, really smooth,” Wilson said. “I’ve really been enjoying it quite a bit, being more independent. Rod has been great with the mentorship. The clients, everybody has been great.” Wilson had her own winding path to practicing law. After graduating from Wahoo Neumann High School in 2015, she was determined to be a rural physician. Wilson attended Creighton and majored in pre-med and accounting while competing on the Bluejay rowing team. After her undergrad, she earned a masters in anatomy from UNMC, still aiming for that career in medicine. As she was finishing up the masters, COVID hit and the world came to a pause. “That was what I call my early 20’s crisis of ‘Do I really want to do this anymore?’” Wilson said. Like Johnson, she had taken a business law class and enjoyed it. After seeking advice from college mentors, friends and family, she entered an accelerated law program at Creighton in May 2021. “I felt like that was the right path for me,” Wilson said, “the right avenue. It fit my strengths, especially the business classes I had had.” Around that same time, Johnson was turning 70, the age he told his family he would start thinking about retiring. Since the beginning, his wife Nancy had worked as his office administrator after working as a nurse to help put Rod through law school. The Johnson law office was built on family-owned ground behind Johnson Farm Equipment, where his brothers Galen and Tom worked. “I always made a claim that more people came into see the kids than to see me,” Rod Johnson said. “I enjoyed that we were able to raise the kids here together.” Read the full story in the print or e-edition. <<Back to the front page |
