Her father, Glenn Johnson Jr., said in the July 12 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that the family has long been involved with libraries, from his own regular visits to the Scottdale library as a child, to Beth’s working at the Seton Hill College library in nearby Greensburg when she was a student there. “Her grandmother was a librarian, too,” he noted. “We’ve always had a feeling for the place.”
“Giving to the library helps meet the library’s needs. And it meets an emotional need for us,” added her mother, Carole Johnson.
With the donation, the library has raised $350,000 of a planned $1 million capital campaign. It intends to open the new facility, triple the size of its current space, by the end of 2007.
The Johnsons have received about $8 million in insurance and reparations since the bombing. They have used some of the money to fund a number of local causes, including the Scottdale library. Last year, they contributed $5,000 for computer equipment. In 2000, when the library outgrew its location in a former grocery store, they gave $10,000 to establish the Beth Ann Johnson Reading Room in an adjacent storefront.
Posted July 15, 2005.