Farewell to Chief Burton Johnson

Let me join the list of people who are expressing their condolences to the family of Burton W. Johnson, this city's first African American Fire Chief .

Funeral services are being held today to eulogize the man who took the reigns of a department in turmoil in the early 1970's when Mayor Walter Washington named him to the top post.

Minority firefighters lead by Romeo Spaulding, Ray Alford and Ted Holmes were leading the protest of the department's racial makeup; at the time it was a majority white male department.

It was also an agency crippled by budget constraints that forced the closing of some firehouses. Chief Johnson ordered the recruitment of more minority firefighters and for the first time took steps to bring women into the department. Johnson died this past week at age 89 from a heart attack at Providence hospital. He lived in the District.