Rose Johnson Quotations

When I was a girl, all we knew was this neighborhood, ... The beaches were ?whites only.? So Turkey Creek is where we went to fish, pick blackberries, recreate. Oftentimes you could see old people walking down to Turkey Creek with their cane poles in their hands. Churches had no pools inside for baptisms then?we all walked down to the creek and waited until the crowd got there.

She would stand sometimes hours to get her correct change back. We would stay there and wait.

One hundred percent of that goes right back out. We're all volunteers.

Someone kept me from drowning, when I fell into the water.

When Mrs. Skinner saw this, she just cried and cried, ... Her baby is over there under that apartment.

We will try to help someone who's trying to help themselves.

The more often I came home, the more trees were gone. It was like my childhood was being eviscerated. There was another OfficeMax or Wal-Mart. ?This is not my home,? I said. I felt in my heart the loss of Turkey Creek. But I think a more dangerous issue is the displacement of our culture.

They should be able to stand on their own after that.

I had to explain what wetlands are, ... We call them swamps. But wetlands are natural sponges, and we need them to absorb water, to filter pollutants.

Class and race play a big part in it and it's bad communication on the part of the bureaucracy also.

How can those people rest in peace with an apartment building over them? What is wrong with this city? Somebody?s got to stop these fools.

I decided I had to do something about it, ... It took from 1999 to 2003 to get that eyesore removed.