Esther Johnson, the first woman admitted to the Rotary International club after it opened its doors to women in 1986, died Sunday at a convalescent home in Santa Monica. She was 89.
For 10 years before she was admitted to Rotary International, a community-service organization with chapters around the world, Mrs. Johnson was executive secretary of the Santa Monica chapter. She also played piano at the club’s weekly luncheon meetings while it still was an all-male organization.
She was invited to become a member in November 1986, the year a California appellate court upheld an action by members of the Duarte chapter of the club, which admitted three women to the group in 1977. At the time, Rotary International responded by revoking the Duarte club’s charter.
The Supreme Court affirmed Rotary International’s integrated status in a 1987 ruling. The decision overturned a club policy in place since 1905, the year Rotary International was founded.
Mrs. Johnson remained above the fray.
“I was at the club for lunch every day, so it didn’t make much difference if they made me a member or not,” she said in 1987. “I think everyone is prepared for it now.”
Born in Brookline, Mass., she moved with her family to Denver before World War II. After high school she became a treasurer for the Denver public school system and met her future husband, Oliver, at church.
They married in 1936 and moved to Santa Monica in 1944. Mrs. Johnson started her own business as a bookkeeper, and in the mid-1950s a Rotary member whom she knew professionally asked her to fill in as the club’s pianist. She kept the job until she retired from her executive position at the club in 2000.
Survivors include her daughter, Sharon Johnson.
