Most days if you want to find Lee Johnson you will find him in his garden at the corner of Hendrix Street and West Main. At 79, Johnson says he still finds life in the garden. Working in these three acres, along with three more at his home, keep him active and mostly healthy. Although at 79 a host of medical issues are slowing him down.
The garden is located beside Statesboro Janitorial at 402 West Main in Statesboro. This is also the business he helped found and built to success with his brother Carl over the past four decades. Lee is retired from the business now and is thrilled that Carl continues that legacy.
Johnson was not able to have a garden last year due to health issues. He thought about not doing it this year but when inflation hit food prices hard, he knew many in his community were struggling. This year he has planted cucumbers, okra, sugar cane, butter beans, peas, squash and tomatoes.
Farming was a way of survival
When Lee Johnson was growing up, farming was a way of survival. He had to drop out of Pope Academy after the third grade, when his father became ill, to help his mother support the family. His dad died at 43 from a heart attack. His first job was working for Donald Wayne Akins on his farm, making $2 per day. Later he moved to Tampa, Florida, to work in the potato houses.
The work was hard and the hours were long, and he soon discovered that he would never find his fortune in Tampa. The best thing he discovered there, he said, was his wife of 61 years, Verna Mae.
Johnson convinced her to follow him back to Statesboro. He returned to work a construction job building the original Holiday Inn (now the Quality Inn) on South Main Street. At 19, Johnson never imagined that short-term construction job would turn into a career that would set his future. After the construction was complete, Mr. Albert Heath hired Lee on as the full-time maintenance man. It was a job he held for 25 years.
Johnson began a part-time cleaning service while he worked for the Holiday Inn. Local businessman Howard Price, the founder of Arrow Rentals, convinced Lee to join him and Charles Best in founding Statesboro Janitorial, Statesboro's first professional janitorial service.
After struggling to build the business, they sold it to Johnson. Johnson would join Charlie and Willard Lewis in becoming the owners of three of the city's first African-American-owned businesses.
Lee and Verna Mae raised three of his siblings after their mother's death: Carl, Roosevelt and Larry. Carl joined Lee in the business after he came back home from his tour of duty with the military.
"Carl and I worked hard to build the business," Lee Johnson said. "Sea Island Bank (now Synovus) was our first bank customer. Dick Burnette helped us get the cleaning contracts with all the other banks and a lot of other businesses in town. He really believed in us and helped us gain the trust of the community. After all these years, Sea Island remains a loyal customer as does charter clients Robbie Franklin and Dan Cook at Franklin's Automotive Group."
Garden of promise
"I started with a little two-acre garden in Whitesville in 1970 tending to it completely with a tiller," Lee Johnson said. "I grew vegetables for my family and a few friends. The more I grew the more I discovered people in need. When we moved to our current location, I was able to purchase a tractor. Mr. Charles Mallard allowed me to farm part of his land across the road from my shop for free."
Two things you will notice when you drive by the building are the oddly dressed and a bit scary mannequins in his windows and large signs with vegetable names on them, like "Tomatoes," "Cucumbers" or "Squash."
The signs let passersby know what freshly picked items from his garden he has available to purchase. He sells enough produce out of his store to mostly cover the cost of the gardens. However, out of these gardens, he feeds a phenomenal amount of people in our community for free.
Labor of love
"As long as I am able and have my health and the money to cover it, you will find me in my garden working to ensure that no family in our town ever has the fear I faced as a child of being hungry," Johnson said.
You never see Lee without his signature smile and a kind, complimentary word.
