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From Derek Walker:

I was very saddened to get the news from a friend that Ray Johnson had died on 4^th June from the cancer that he’d been diagnosed with only a few short months ago . Ray’s wife Pat died about five years ago. He is survived by his daughter Michelle

I first met Ray when my family and I were transferred from Perth to Port Moresby in 1964. Ray and his family had been transferred from La Perouse some time previously and even then he made no secret of his ambition to eventually become Manager La Perouse He had what was taken by some to be an offhand manner, but once you got to know him and especially if you were interested in cricket and classical music, (which I was) his manner thawed and we becamegood friends. This was helped by th fact that the Johnsons’ house was up a flight of stone steps on the side of our house and each Sunday evening we would walk up those steps (taking care not todisturb the small snakes that were usually sunning themjselves on them) for a barbecue with the Johnsons. When the cricket season started Ray and I managed to persuade the Konedobu cricket club that we were practicallyTest material The side always seemed to be chronically short of players and Ray and I went through the season alternately playing in the number10 and number 11spots.

Transferring from Moresby to Lae in 1965 I lost touch with Ray until out of the blue he arrived in Lae as manager and we picked up the friendship again. After two years he went back down south and took on the job of Asst Manager La Perouse, bu had to wait 12 years before Ken Stone eventually retired and Ray achieved his ambition.Unfortunately for Ray the powers that be decided they needed him in Maritime head office and he became Manager Operational Procedures (MOPS), cutting short his stint as Manager La Perouse.

When I retired as Manager Perth Maritime in 1990 Ray somehow wangled a trip over to the West for my farewell do at Gnangara, which I thought wa extremely kind of him

One thing that I always thought rather eccentric in a man who spent his working life in telecommunications was that Ray flatly refused to have a computer in the house after he retired, so any communication one had with him had to be by snail mail or telephone.

So long Ray, it was good to know you