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Johnston -- Marjorie Cecil Johnston, 96, a resident of Albuquerque, born December 27, 1904 in Clark County, MO, daughter of Jordan Leroy Johnston and Maggie Sisson Johnston, died Thursday, April 19, 2001. She is survived by a sister, Edith K. Sampson; two nieces, Ellanie and Mindy Sampson; and a great-nephew, Alexander Daniel Sterling, all of Albuquerque; and two cousins, Helen Bricker and Dorothy Jean Phillips, both of Kahoka, MO. Marjorie enjoyed a long professional career including high school, college and graduate school teaching, supervision of student teachers, and inter-American and international education and administrative oversight of the National Defense Education Act. At the time of her retirement in 1967, she was Chief of the Instructional Resources Branch of the United States Office of Education. Marjorie was author of Education in Mexico, published by the U.S. Government Printing Office, and co-author of four Spanish textbooks, as well as contributor to several professional journals. She is listed in the World Who's Who of Women and in the Phi Beta Kappa Directory. Marjorie was given many honors, beginning as high school Valedictorian in 1923 and election to Phi Beta Kappa, Junior Five, at The University of Texas in 1926. In 1939, she received a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship for post-doctoral research in language teaching at the Harvard Radcliffe Graduate School and the University of New Mexico. In 1942, Marjorie was named the first language teaching Specialist in the United States Office of Education. For three summers, during WWII, she was appointed the U.S. Director of the Spanish Language Institute sponsored by the Department of State at the National University of Mexico. Marjorie represented the Office of Education at the opening of the Field School of the Texas State College for Women, in Saltillo, Mexico. In 1946, she organized and headed the Language Department of the new American Institute for Foreign Trade, established on the site of the Air Force Air Field Thunderbird Number One. In 1950, Marjorie represented the U.S. Office of Education in the delegation invited by the Cuban Government to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of the public school system in Cuba. Also in 1950, she was elected President of the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese, and for several years was an Associate Editor of Hispania, the journal of that association. In 1960, Marjorie was a participant in the first Cultural Exchange Program with the Soviet Union. She gave the commencement address, in 1966, to the first class to graduate from the All-Spanish Curriculum at Covell College. After retirement in Albuquerque, in 1967, Marjorie did volunteer work at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center and with the Friends for the Albuquerque Public Library, serving for ten years as manager of the used bookshop in the Main Library. She became active in the Pan American Round Table in 1976 and for eight years chaired the Education Committee, which offered school programs to stimulate interest in the Latin American countries. Marjorie was a life member of the National Education Association, Pi Lambda Theta and the Modern Language Association; and honorary member of the American Association of Teachers of French and the Texas State Association of Foreign Language Teachers. She was an active gardener and loved roses, above all other flowers. Marjorie will be deeply missed by her family. Interment of cremains were held in Bethlehem Cemetery, Clark County, MO, at the foot of Baby Leroy Sisson Johnston's grave and adjacent to that of her parents. A brief Memorial Service will be held Tuesday, April 24, 11:00 a.m. at University Heights United Methodist Church, 2210 Silver SE. Mindy Sampson, organist for the services, will play Marjorie's favorite hymns. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial contributions be made to the American Red Cross, P.O. Box 80250, Albuquerque, NM, 87198. Arrangements by Aspen Funeral Alternatives, 1935 Juan Tabo NE (323-9000).
        Published on: Tue April 24, 2001