McHenry Museum

A memorial to honor Odessa P. Johnson will be held on Saturday, May 30, 2026 at Modesto Junior College’s East Campus (the main campus), 435 College Ave in Modesto.

A reception will be held at 1:00 p.m that day in the art gallery and a Celebration of Life service will begin at 2:30 p.m. in the auditorium.

The public is invited to attend.

It is with great sadness that we share the death of Odessa P Johnson.

Odessa was born on April 26, 1939, in Greenville, South Carolina, during the time of segregation in the southern United States. After receiving her master’s degree from Columbia University, she traveled by train and arrived to Modesto at our local historic rail station in 1962.

She was hired as Modesto High School’s first African American teacher, teaching in business and typing. She was the only African American on staff when she was hired by Modesto Junior College in 1970, where she was as a counselor. In 1984, she worked to found the Modesto Institute for Continued Learning (MICL) so that area adults had the opportunity to continue learning through a higher education format.

In 1991, she was elected to the Modesto City Schools board of education and in 1999 was appointed as a University of California regent, where she advocated for a medical school to be included at UC Merced.

Odessa shared her story with the McHenry Museum & Historical Society in 2024 and is featured as an extraordinary woman in our 2025 publication, ‘StaniStory: Change and Continuity in Stanislaus County,’ by Keith Highiet and David Seymour.

Our thoughts are with her daughter, Sylvia, and family. The products of Odessa’s tireless efforts in education continue to profoundly impact our community today.